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Just wanted to let you all know that I’m taking a bit of personal time off from the blog for family. I’ll be back in a couple of weeks. Thank you for your support of FlicksChick.com!

Sarah

Braveheart is one of the best movies ever made. And now, let me share what I dislike about this film.

William Wallace, real-life hero, larger-than-legend man, and protagonist of this week’s BP, has a serious set of morals. These morals most likely stem from his Christian beliefs (he evinces a faith in God several times in the film) as well as his upbringing by first his father and then his Uncle Argyle, who both emphasize honesty, integrity, and the use of one’s mind (before weapons) to solve problems. Wallace grows up and returns home to live at peace with everyone. He reconnects with the woman he’s dreamed of apparently all through his adolescence and early adulthood (even though she’s a small child when he leaves his original home) and marries her secretly because the diabolical English king has reinstituted prima nocta (jus primae noctis, for those of you pickier than Braveheart about proper Latin-isms). In case you’re not familiar with medieval laws, the (most likely) historically inaccurate law of prima nocta allows a lord (an English one, in this case) to sleep with any common girl on her wedding night. What an awesome society.

Wallace and his new bride, Murron, seem to have successfully avoided such a revolting situation by conducting their nuptials in the woods at dark, and we viewers are apparently supposed to rejoice when they consummate their marriage in the following scene. For me, here’s where Braveheart first gets a bit dicey as far as upholding the morals which it so highly totes. I mean, I get it. Two people love each other, get married, and have sex. That’s the normal way of the world. But do I have to watch it? Wallace is so passionate about not sharing his wife sexually with anyone else (that’s legitimate), but we the viewers share her with him. In the post-wedding scene, both characters are unclothed, but it is Murron whose modesty is violated by the camera. Who cares if an overly hairy Mel Gibson shows up shirtless? It’s a different thing for a woman to take her shirt off and face the camera. In short, what the film purports to be lovely is tarnished by our forced voyeurism.

Murron really gets the short straw in this movie (spoiler alert!). Not only is she exposed sexually, but she’s also brutally executed after she and Wallace maim some guards who try to assault her. For the rest of the film, avenging Murron’s death is Wallace’s main motivation in his quest to overthrow English domination and establish a free Scotland under its own king. Wallace is portrayed as determined, valiant, ingenious, and undeterred by others’ lack of faith in his cause. What a great guy.

But then Wallace meets Princess Isabelle. She’s beautiful, caring, intelligent, and lonely. Her marriage to the Prince of Wales is basically just a formality. Plus, she’s heard all the tales about Wallace and his daring deeds. She’s putty in his hands. But it seems Wallace is also no match for Isabelle’s charms. After she warns him of danger a second time, Wallace tracks her to a secluded cottage in the woods where the two embark on a sexual relationship. This is where Braveheart really irks me.

I just don’t get the need for another woman. If Wallace is truly motivated only by the thirst to avenge his wife and to ensure that what happened to her never happens to another Scottish person, if he eats and breathes freedom, if he is so obsessed with vengeance that he sees and speaks to Murron in his sleep, then what in the world is he doing dallying with another woman? And here’s the kicker: Isabelle is married. Yes, I mentioned that earlier, but it’s so crucial. Since Wallace is particularly adamant about his wife only sleeping with him, doesn’t it make him a horrible hypocrite when he chooses to sleep with another man’s wife? Or does it not matter because Isabelle’s marriage isn’t great or because she’s technically on the English side (by marriage)?

I think it does matter. Greatly.

In Braveheart‘s famous final scene, there are obvious overtones of Christian symbolism: namely, the image of an innocent man dying on a “cross” for others’ freedom. I’ve always found this part of the movie incredibly beautiful and moving–especially when Murron (yes, she’s still dead) shows up right after Wallace utters his famous “Freedom!” line before his beheading. The whole scene is so gruesome, but it is so perfectly shot, and the score is so absolutely breathtaking–still, the fact that “Freedom” is the last word Wallace says seems to point to a higher cause for which he is willing to die, a cause that goes beyond him and his revenge quest. So again, why the other woman?

For Me Then…

Don’t get me wrong. I love this movie. It is one of my all-time favorites. And while I struggle with the roles of the film’s female characters and how they (especially Isabelle) damage the integrity of Wallace’s character, I still think Braveheart offers its viewers a higher calling and deeper meaning than most movies do.

I don’t enjoy all the film’s violence, but there is a point to (most of) it: Freedom is costly. It is difficult for many of us today to truly value freedom because we don’t actually understand what it means or what it’s worth. Some Americans dishonor our flag and our national anthem because they say our country isn’t free enough for them. Ironically, they can only say these things because in the past someone died for our right to freedom of speech.

In Braveheart, William Wallace uses his dying breaths to cry out for freedom–but not for himself. Obviously, he will never live under the rule of a Scottish king, but he knows that all his sacrifices might give another person the chance for freedom. To me, that kind of selflessness is mind-blowing. It’s also inspiring–especially because there is an easier way out for Wallace in the end. If he just swears loyalty to the English king or begs his forgiveness or kisses the royal seal, he could forego all the torture and go straight to the beheading. But Wallace knows he has to make a point to those witnessing his death and to his countrymen who are often tempted with alternatives (like land and titles) to the discomfort and trauma of fighting for what one believes in. Robert the Bruce is one of those countrymen who vacillates between one side of the conflict and the other. He “want[s] to believe” in and commit to Wallace’s cause, but he does not and he cannot–until Wallace gives the ultimate sacrifice for those he leaves behind. To the Bruce and to Wallace’s comrades, freedom becomes equal to the worth of the life of a dear friend, which is a hefty pricetag. What would one not give for the life of a friend?

As the film closes and the Scots, “starving and outnumbered, [charge] the fields of Bannockburn” to “[fight] like warrior-poets” and to “[win] their freedom,” Wallace is deceased but not gone. His presence is symbolized in his sword that his friend Hamish throws onto the battlefield before the Scots advance. The sword goes before the host of Scotland, just as Wallace went before them to open their minds and hearts to the cause of freedom. Braveheart isn’t a tragic romance about Wallace and his wife and their deaths. It’s a victory song lauding the gift one person made of himself to the cause of liberty. It’s a challenge to ignore voices that tell you to give up your dream of something higher than yourself. And it’s a call to step away from what is easy, pursue the right, and confront the opposition. For only then will we actually be living, and we have nothing to lose that is worth keeping.

A Scottish local once asked Mel Gibson why he had filmed the Battle of Stirling Bridge on a plain and not at the bridge itself. Gibson told him that “the bridge got in the way.” The Scot responded, “Aye…That’s what the English found.” This comical exchange highlights most people’s biggest complaint about Braveheart (1995; Icon Productions, Ladd Company, Paramount): its lack of historical accuracy. As one critic wrote, “The events aren’t accurate, the dates aren’t accurate, the characters aren’t accurate, the names aren’t accurate, the clothes aren’t accurate—in short, just about nothing is accurate.” But even though Braveheart‘s storyline isn’t absolutely true, one can’t really deny that the film is compelling and beautiful.

In 1983, Randall Wallace, Braveheart‘s screenwriter and no relation to the film’s hero William Wallace, took a trip to Scotland to explore his Scottish roots. Randall walked into a castle and was confronted with two statues, one of Robert the Bruce, Scotland’s most famous king, and the other of an armor-clad warrior with only the name “Wallace” at its base. The castle guard told Randall that Wallace was Scotland’s greatest hero, and the encounter moved Randall to first wonder how such a hero’s story had never been told to the wider world and then to launch himself into researching what was known about Wallace. Supposedly, Randall couldn’t find very many hard facts about the historical William Wallace, but he did discover a fifteenth-century epic poem called The Actes and Deidis of the Illustre and Vallyeant Campioun Schir William Wallace by a poet known as Blind Harry. Blind Harry’s work, though very popular in Scotland, was known to be historical fiction; but it inspired Randall, who commented later, “Is Blind Harry true? I don’t know. I know that it spoke to my heart and that’s what matters to me, that it spoke to my heart.” Randall then attempted to craft a film that spoke in the same way to its viewers’ hearts.

Interestingly, though, the grand scale of Braveheart was unique for its time. In fact, the years preceding Gibson’s film hadn’t been much inclined toward epics, but the success of Braveheart launched a spate of visually stunning historical movies, namely 1998’s should-have-been BP Saving Private Ryan and 2000’s BP Gladiator (which shares a number of similarities with Braveheart). To me, this trend of violent, yet deeply moving films is just another avenue through which people around the turn of the century/millennium were attempting to understand both the past that had shaped their lives and the chaotic present that they were learning to navigate.

Braveheart is famously about freedom–what it costs, what it’s worth, who should have it, how to get it, etc. As the twentieth century came to a close, people, of course, seemed to be looking back over the past 100 years or so to glean what meaning they could from the century’s events (we saw this in Forrest Gump last week as well). Although Braveheart‘s historical (or not-so-historical) events are set in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the concepts of oppression, violence, and liberty that feature so prominently in the film were major features of the twentieth century as well with its two World Wars and countless other major military conflicts. Various people groups (such as Jews during the Holocaust, African Americans prior to the Civil Rights Movement, and the people of Eastern Europe and Russia behind the Iron Curtain) experienced severe subjugation and abuse prior to their quests for freedom. Braveheart, then, with its emotionally stirring score and memorable, impassioned speeches about fighting for one’s rights and freedoms resonated with many viewers in the mid-1990s.

In a year in which Apollo 13 was viewed as the frontrunner for Best Picture, Braveheart swept in to the Academy Awards and took home five Oscars for its ten nominations, winning for Cinematography, Sound Effects Editing, Makeup, Directing for Mel Gibson, and Best Picture. It most notably (in my mind) failed to win for Music (Original Dramatic Score) for James Horner’s stunningly gorgeous composition, a score that still finds itself on many critics’ list of greatest movie music of all time (Horner would blow his competition away two years later with his work for Titanic). Braveheart also was not a winner for Sound, Costume Design, Film Editing, and Writing (Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen).

Whatever the number of Oscars or the amount of criticism over its lack of accuracy, to me Braveheart is one of the best films ever made. In its (almost) pre-CGI purity, the film encapsulates a dying era in movie-making and a lost art form. It just seems way more real (and, hence, more meaningful) than all the sci-fi/super hero stuff that studios churn out to “inspire” us nowadays. If we take Braveheart for what it is–a story that plays with legend and truth, that blurs medieval romance and epic violence–we can begin to appreciate the brilliance of each shot selection, the alternately heart-wrenching and rousing score, and the ability of the script and actors to move us emotionally.

For more thoughts on Braveheart and its significance, please check out this weekend’s post!

Some people live extraordinary lives. The fictional Forrest Gump is one of those people. Despite Forrest’s early physical impairment with his legs and his lack of mental acuity, which other characters repeatedly emphasize, the title character of this week’s BP manages to (spoiler alert!) graduate from high school, become a college football star (and earn a college degree), win the Medal of Honor for his service in Vietnam, morph into a superstar table tennis player, captain a shrimping boat, become a millionaire, inspire America with his cross-country running adventure, win the heart of the woman he’s loved for almost his whole life, and raise his son Forrest Jr.–all while hobnobbing with U.S. Presidents and rock and roll superstars during some of the twentieth century’s most dynamic events.

But…Forrest doesn’t dwell on any major incident for very long. He whips through the happenings of his life as fast as he famously runs. In fact, he never seems to grasp the importance of the events he witnesses and in which he plays a role. Instead, his mind returns time and time again to two people: his mother (and the words of wisdom she passes down to him before her death) and Jenny, his best friend from childhood and his eventual wife. Each grand occurrence in Forrest’s life–historical and personal–is judged by how those two women respond to it and/or how each incident makes Forrest think or feel about his two leading ladies. And those ladies couldn’t be more different.

Mama Gump is endlessly supportive of Forrest and determined that her son’s physical and mental challenges will not limit anything he wants to do. She tells him early on in the film after some people stare at Forrest’s new leg braces, “You’re the same as everybody else…You are no different.” The film’s viewer knows this statement isn’t exactly true. Forrest is different from everyone else he encounters in the movie. However, Mama’s words do give Forrest the confidence to live as if what she said is true. Throughout the film, Forrest informs us viewers of what Mama says about everything, including normalcy, wealth, miracles, destiny, and dying. Her words lay the foundation of how Forrest lives his life. For that reason, many of Forrest Gump‘s most memorable lines come from Mama, as recited by Forrest: “Stupid is as stupid does.” “Life is like a box of chocolate. You never know what you’re gonna get.” On the surface, these sayings seem to be simple wisdom for a simple-minded man, but there’s no denying the depth of either Mama’s words or Forrest’s mind.

On the other hand, Jenny, Forrest’s childhood friend and later lover/wife recognizes throughout the entire movie that Forrest is different from everyone else. She doesn’t harp on this fact, but rather accepts that Forrest operates in a unique way and attunes herself to his quirks. Jenny is able to do this because she also is at a disadvantage in the larger world. Although not physically or mentally challenged like Forrest, Jenny is emotionally and psychologically scarred from the abuse she suffers as a child. Her early years cause her to grow into a restless, promiscuous, and easily influenced young adult who cannot settle in one place for very long. Despite Forrest’s best attempts to protect Jenny, she leaves him to embark on her next “adventure” every time.

Jenny and Forrest both run throughout the movie. Jenny runs away on buses and in cars with strangers, endlessly trying to escape her haunting past. Forrest literally runs everywhere because it’s one thing he excels at and enjoys. No running is necessary once Jenny and Forrest decide to be together toward the end of the film. Forrest tells us that he and Jenny “[go] together like peas and carrots.” What he means to say is that they are two peas in a pod, but what he actually says implies that their differences make them fit together. With Jenny, Forrest feels understood and complete. Apart from Jenny, Forrest can only talk about how he misses her and wishes he could share his life’s events with her.

(Spoiler alert!) When Forrest experiences the deaths of people close to him, namely his mother and his Army friend Bubba, he stops after relating the fact of their deaths and says, “That’s all I have to say about that.” Forrest doesn’t process those deaths out loud in his narrative on the bus stop bench. But after his marriage to Jenny and her death, Forrest visits her grave and updates her on how he and little Forrest are doing without her. He is able to talk to Jenny although she is gone. They are still bonded together, like they were throughout Forrest’s life story even when they were physically apart. And I suppose that gives a satisfactory ending to Forrest’s account of his colorful life.

For Me Then…

Mama Gump’s asking “What’s normal anyways?” really sums up this film for me. Clearly, Forrest is unique. He knows it. His mother knows it. Jenny knows it. Forrest’s listeners on the bench know it. We the viewers know it. But what appear to many characters in the film to be Forrest’s disadvantages really end up being his strengths. His simplemindedness allows him to forget himself and constantly focus on the well-being of others and how he can contribute to that well-being. He is selfless, courageous, and compassionate–all positive attributes that diminish the importance of the fact that Forrest has a low IQ.

Furthermore, not too many other characters (if any) in the film are exactly “normal.” Jenny has a multitude of issues stemming from her childhood experiences. Lieutenant Dan struggles after losing his legs in Vietnam. Bubba seems to have some mental impairment (or at least some sort of bizarre obsession with shrimping). Mama herself doesn’t exactly fit in with her society. But all these disadvantages are okay. We the audience come to know and love each of these characters because their issues make them seem like real, complicated, flawed people. Anyhow, who wants to live in a world where all the people are the same? Besides, intelligence, physical perfection, social acceptance, etc. are all fleeting and don’t matter as much as our cultures and societies tell us they do. Forrest Gump shows us that other things are more important. “I’m not the smart man. But I know what love is,” says Forrest. And maybe that makes him intelligent after all.

I didn’t plan it this way on purpose, but Forrest Gump (1994; Paramount) is about the most perfect Best Picture winner one could watch during the week of the Fourth of July. As the movie sweeps through a stretch of time from the 1950s to the 1980s, the film’s title character, a kind and gentle man with a low IQ, finds himself a participant in and witness to some of the most important/memorable happenings in twentieth century American history. Forrest meets several U.S. Presidents, Elvis, and John Lennon; plays football for National Champion Alabama Crimson Tide; fights in the Vietnam War; and experiences the unrest of the 1960s and 70s through the flower child/hippie indiscretions of Jenny, his best friend from childhood. In short, what we get with Forrest Gump is a tender story of the lives of two American kids, both underprivileged in certain ways, who grow up before our eyes while we feast on a picnic of American history worthy of the holiday we’ll celebrate tomorrow.

The year of Forrest Gump‘s release saw its own smorgasbord of events that helped to define the century. 1994 commenced with a crowbar attack on Nancy Kerrigan (and the denials of Tonya Harding) that gave us all a glimpse into the circus that is the world of figure skating. There was also the Los Angeles earthquake that killed 60 people. In May 1994, Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as the first black president of South Africa. The following month Nicole Brown Simpson was murdered, and O. J. Simpson took off on his now-famous “slow-speed” chase. Major League Baseball went on strike in August, which meant there was no World Series for the first time in 90 years. And by the end of the year, Russia had invaded Chechnya.

1994, then, was a busy year–and a good year for film as well. Forrest Gump defeated some major motion pictures to claim the year’s top prize–including a couple of films that seem to always find themselves on lists of movies that should have won BP. Some big-name competitors were: The Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction, The Lion King, Legends of the Fall, Little Women, Speed, Interview with the Vampire, and The Mask, to name a few. Despite the tough competition, Forrest Gump won 6 Oscars for its 13 nominations: Film Editing, Writing (Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published) for Eric Roth’s adaptation of Winston Groom’s 1986 novel of the same name, Visual Effects, Directing for Robert Zemeckis, Actor in a Leading Role for Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump (Hanks had also won Best Actor the previous year for Philadelphia), and Best Picture. The film failed to take home Academy Awards in the following categories for which it was nominated: Art Direction, Makeup, Cinematography, Sound, Sound Effects Editing, Music (Original Score), and Actor in a Supporting Role for Gary Sinise as the unforgettable Lieutenant Dan Taylor.

What made Forrest Gump stand out from the crowd of contenders? Good question. Personally, I think Forrest Gump encapsulates what people thought about the 1990s themselves–it was a lighthearted time threaded through with some really dark, sad, and ominous stuff. Forrest Gump is the same way. It’s much funnier than I remembered it being from my previous exposure to it, but it has undertones of some pretty raunchy stuff (such as child sexual abuse) and some not as subtle inclusions of drug use and meaningless violence. Plus, after Schindler’s List won BP in 1993, it is possible that Academy voters were looking for something that was a bit lighter but still meaningful.

Today, as we approach the twenty-fifth anniversary of the film’s release (this coming Saturday, as a matter of fact!), Forrest Gump still shows its relevance through its portrayal of ordinary people finding themselves part of larger-than-life events–and, ironically, that kind of sums up every Fourth of July for most of us. The United States as an idea, an ideal, a wild experiment in liberty, and a glorious celebration of the rights of humanity eclipses our ordinary holiday barbecues, parades, and fireworks shows by which we mark the country’s birthday. Still, like Forrest, we find ourselves participants in the greatness of America–and maybe tomorrow we should celebrate that fact as well.

For more thoughts on Forrest Gump and its significance, please check out this weekend’s post!

The word “holocaust” comes from two Greek words, one meaning “whole” and the other meaning “burning”/”burned.” The connotation of the word implies a burnt offering, such as a sacrifice to a deity. In Schindler’s List, both the imagery of burning and the idea of sacrifice figure prominently, never letting the viewer forget the purpose of the film is to remember the Holocaust and honor its victims and survivors.

As noted in this week’s warm-up post, Schindler’s List is a black-and-white movie–but not all of the film is lacking color. In the opening scene, a Jewish family gathers around a table in their home. An older man sings, while the candles in two tall candlesticks burn. The camera focuses on the flame of one of the candles as it burns low, and very subtly the film morphs from color to black-and-white, after which the candle goes out with an upward stream of smoke. Several points seem to be made in this scene. First, we see the unity and harmlessness of the Jewish family and their religion. The scene is peaceful and hauntingly sad as the family disappears from view–just as millions of Jews disappeared forever during the Holocaust. The smoking candle also hints at the decimation of the Jews that will be pictured later in the film: What was strong and warm will become weak and then will be no more. Furthermore, there is the obvious connection with the definition of holocaust: The Jews will both literally (especially in the crematoriums of the death camps) and figuratively be burned up by the horror of the Nazis’ “Final Solution” to the Jewish “problem.” Perhaps one hopeful idea that one can draw from the smoldering candle is that the Holocaust will eventually burn itself out, its hatred and ignorance finally consuming it.

Another (and more famous) feature of Schindler’s List with a color connected to the idea of burning is the little girl in the red coat. She first appears during the German liquidation of the Krakow ghetto, one of the most violent scenes in the film. The little girl scampers around, unsure of what is happening and not knowing where to go. She walks by soldiers and enters tenements that have already been cleared of their residents. Eventually, she crawls under a bed, but the film’s viewers know that her hiding place is lame and she will be captured. Schindler stops at a place overlooking the ghetto while riding horses with his mistress and sees the little girl in the streets below. He is deeply moved by her plight, but does nothing to help her or anyone else. Much later in the film, the little girl appears again. Still dressed in her red coat, but now deceased, she is wheeled past a shocked Schindler on her way to the massive pile of burning Jewish bodies as the Nazis prepare to retreat in the face of the advancing Allied forces. The brief scene changes Schindler forever; he resolves to save as many of his Jewish workers as he can. The little girl herself, though physically annihilated in the Holocaust, also plays a symbolic role. Being so young and wearing the color red (red being clearly connected with fire and burning), the little girl again connects the innocence of the Jewish people with the horror of their massacre and immolation during World War II. She also, according to Steven Spielberg, represents how obvious it was to those in the highest levels of government in the Allied nations (especially the United States) that the Holocaust was occurring–still, those leaders did nothing to stop the killings, choosing instead to focus on winning the war.

Spielberg partly blames those Allied leaders for the millions of Jews who were forced to become sacrifices–actual burnt offerings–during the Holocaust. While there’s no denying the unfathomable price paid by the Jewish people during the second World War, the thing about sacrifices, at least in the Old Testament/burnt offering context, is that they must be given willingly. And that is not true of the Jews during the Holocaust. While many, if not most, surrendered their possessions, their rights, and their lives, they did so each time with the belief that their situation had gotten as bad as it could possibly be. Each new regulation, every additional limit to Jewish freedom was the height of what German racism must be able to imagine. Several Jewish characters express this misguided belief during the film, and they are always wrong. The Germans demanded every sacrifice of the Jews–even the incomprehensible surrender of their lives–but the Jews did not hand themselves over to the Germans willingly. They clearly wanted life and not the torture and death they were given.

The character in Schindler’s List who does sacrifice willingly is Schindler himself. Though at first he’s only interested in money and women and worming his way into the “it” crowd of influential Nazis, by the end of the film, he has transformed into a man who gives everything he has–his women, his business, and his money–in order to save others. He is jokingly called Moses by the evil Amon Goeth–and Schindler is indeed a lot like the biblical hero in that he gives up a life of luxury to lead an enslaved people to eventual freedom. Thomas Keneally’s original title for his novel on which the film is based is called Schindler’s Ark, again emphasizing a biblical character (Noah) who lost much to save many.

For Me Then…

In their salvific roles, Moses and Noah can be seen as precursors of Jesus Christ, so it is interesting that a film focusing on Jews during the Holocaust contains a somewhat Christian message of hope and renewal. Schindler himself, with all his faults, makes a pretty lame Christlike figure–still, his rescue of over 1,200 Jews, as well as the sacrifice he must make to achieve this, puts an end to Jewish “burnt offerings” and ushers in a new period of life and restoration.

Like the beginning of the film, the end also features fire and color (spoiler alert!). Once he has rescued them, Schindler’s Jews are permitted again to celebrate the Sabbath–with candles like those they had at the beginning of the movie. And at the close of the film in a deeply moving (and full color) scene, the actual surviving Jews that Schindler saved, along with the actors who played them in the film, place rocks on his tombstone as a memorial. Here, the abandonment of black-and-white coloring again indicates renewal. The past will never be forgotten–nor should it be–but there is hope in the future because of people like Oskar Schindler, people who see the right and do it, despite the risk to themselves and in spite of the fact that they may never receive anything in return.

Six million is a huge number, hard to comprehend, difficult to picture in one’s mind. Six million is the estimated number of Jews killed in the Holocaust that was planned and executed by Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party in the first half of the twentieth century. Add to that number the several millions of Gypsies, homosexuals, and disabled or mentally ill persons also massacred by the Nazis, and the final death toll of the Holocaust is closer to ten million.

For Steven Spielberg, arguably the most famous and successful movie director of our time, the Holocaust is not so much about numbers as it is about individuals. A Jew himself, Spielberg recalls how the Holocaust has always been a part of his life: “When I was very young, I remember my mother telling me about a friend of hers in Germany, a pianist who played a symphony that wasn’t permitted, and the Germans came up on stage and broke every finger on her hands. I grew up with stories of Nazis breaking the fingers of Jews…In a strange way my life has always come back to images surrounding the Holocaust. The Holocaust had been a part of my life, just based on what my parents would say at the dinner table. We lost cousins, aunts, uncles.”

In the early 1980s, when Spielberg was first approached to make a film based on Thomas Keneally’s 1982 novel Schindler’s Ark (published in the U.S. as Schindler’s List), he declined, thinking he was not at a point in his life where he could deal with the difficult subject matter in a way that was meaningful enough. Ironically, Keneally had also hesitated before tackling the Schindler story. On his way home to Australia from a book signing in Beverly Hills in 1980, Keneally entered a shop looking for a new briefcase. The shop owner was a man named Poldek Pfefferberg, a Jewish man who, along with his wife, had survived the Holocaust because Oskar Schindler had employed them in his factory–and, thus, had put their names on his famous list. For years, Pfefferberg had petitioned any writers or film-makers whom he encountered to take up Schindler’s story. After seeing Pfefferberg’s extensive files on Schindler, Keneally agreed to write the book. It took nearly a decade after the book’s publication for Pfefferberg to finally convince Spielberg to bring Schindler’s story to the big screen. Schindler’s List (1993; Universal Pictures, Amblin Entertainment) was released the same year the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum was dedicated in Washington, D.C. The following year, Spielberg founded the USC Shoah Foundation, an organization “dedicated to making audio-visual interviews with survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust and other genocides a compelling voice for education and action.” To date, the foundation has collected over 55,000 audio-visual testimonies conducted in 65 countries and 43 languages.

The first black-and-white movie to win Best Picture since 1960’s The Apartment, Schindler’s List went on to win 7 Oscars for its 12 nominations: Art Direction, Cinematography, Film Editing, Music (Original Score) for John Williams, Writing (Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published), Directing for Steven Spielberg, and Best Picture. It failed to win for Sound (which it lost to Spielberg’s other 1993 blockbuster Jurassic Park), Costume Design, Makeup, Actor in a Supporting Role for Ralph Fiennes as Amon Goeth, and Actor in a Leading Role for Liam Neeson as Oskar Schindler.

Not intended to please audiences as much as to display past reality to a present culture that needs to remember the staggering cost of empowered hatred, Schindler’s List remains one of the most moving motion pictures ever created. And it will never cease to be relevant. In an interview he gave last year in honor of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the film’s release, Spielberg told NBC News’ Lester Holt, “I think there’s even more at stake than there was back then [in 1993]…When collective hate organizes and gets industrialized, then genocide follows…We have to take it more seriously today than I think we have had to take it in a generation.” In other words, the message of Schindler’s List–that people must stand up to evil; resist injustice; and risk their own fortunes, comfort, and lives to save those who cannot save themselves–is something we should never tire of hearing and something we should never stop striving to live up to. It is no surprise, then, that Steven Spielberg considers Schindler’s List to be his greatest achievement: “I don’t think I’ll ever do anything as important,” he said. “So this, for me, is something that I will always be proudest of.”

For more thoughts on Schindler’s List and its significance, please check out this weekend’s post!

In Unforgiven, Sheriff Little Bill Daggett doesn’t allow guns in the town of Big Whiskey. This is ironic for a couple of reasons. First, the year is 1881, and Big Whiskey is part of the old Wild West, where guns are just a part of daily life. The era of the Old West is coming to a close; but for the moment it still exists; and where it exists, there are weapons. Second, the film is super quick to show its viewers that one doesn’t need a gun to commit an atrocious act of violence. When a couple of cowboys disfigure (with a knife) the face of a Big Whiskey prostitute, their heinous act sets in motion a series of violent encounters, namely between Little Bill and several gunfighters who come to town to enact a revenge killing on the cowboys and collect the $1,000 reward promised by the prostitutes to whomever can accomplish the task.

In short, while the heavily armed Little Bill and his men prohibit others from carrying guns, those others find themselves at the mercy of a corrupt system of law enforcement in which those who have the weapons make the rules, decide who is guilty/innocent, and assault anyone they please (once they’ve confirmed that their victims are weaponless and helpless, of course).

Into this mess ride Bill Munny, his old partner Ned Logan, and his new partner the Schofield Kid. Back in the day, Munny and Ned were heavy drinkers and prolific killers. But after both men married, their lives changed dramatically–especially Munny’s. Now a middle-aged widower with two young children, Munny tells everyone how his wife had helped him transform his life. He insists that he doesn’t drink anymore because each evil, violent act he committed in the past had been a result of his drunkenness (His “drink made me do it” defense is put on a bit thick, in my opinion). When the Kid shows up at Munny’s house because he’s heard and believed the stories about Munny’s expertise at killing people, Munny is hesitant to go along with the Kid’s plan to seek out and kill the Big Whiskey cowboys. But the reward money calls to him; and although he has no personal connection to the wronged woman, he recruits Ned and heads off to Big Whiskey, a choice that hints that Munny might not be as changed as he keeps claiming he is.

We viewers become especially convinced that something is truly lacking morally in Munny when (spoiler alert!) he takes the rifle from Ned, who can’t bring himself to shoot the cowboys, and deliberately aims and fires repeatedly at the more innocent cowboy. Munny hasn’t been drinking alcohol this time, and it isn’t his possessing a gun that makes him do it. Though he yells to the other cowboys to comfort their mortally wounded comrade in his last moments, his minor compassion comes too late. Munny still does the deed–seemingly just for the money–and he helps the Kid pursue and execute the second guilty cowboy as well.

At this point in the film, what we get from the Kid, an irascible, obnoxious, bloodthirsty character for most of the movie, is what we originally thought we would get from the “reformed” Munny. The Kid is dramatically affected by his first kill. He tries to express his regret to Munny: “It don’t seem real… how he ain’t gonna never breathe again, ever… how he’s dead. And the other one too. All on account of pulling a trigger.” Munny replies (and please excuse the profanity), “It’s a hell of a thing, killing a man. Take away all he’s got and all he’s ever gonna have.” Both men make note of the power inherent in holding a gun, but the Kid feels the great weight of responsibility for the life of his fellow man and is so sickened by what he’s done that he refuses his share of the reward money and leaves Munny to seek revenge on Little Bill, who has killed Ned.

It is in this last scene, Munny’s revenge quest, that his true nature is revealed. Little Bill and his cronies are celebrating what they see as their elimination of all the “rabble” in the town, so they are unprepared when Munny–drunk and armed with the Kid’s gun–walks into the saloon and promises vengeance on them all. Little Bill then asks Munny to identify himself as the man who had killed women and child in the past; and without hesitation, Munny does. No more does he blame his past on liquor or claim that his wife had changed him before her premature death. Instead, he seems to become his real self. As he blows away one man after the next, his aim is perfect, his demeanor is calm, and his mercy is non-existent. Leaving behind the carnage in the saloon and venturing out into the storm, he threatens all the townspeople, ” All right, I’m coming out. Any man I see out there, I’m gonna shoot him…I’m not only gonna kill him, but I’m gonna kill his wife, all his friends, and burn his…house down.” Now Munny has the gun and dictates everyone else’s behavior.

For Me Then…

Each time someone storms into a school, business, house of worship, etc. and employs guns to kill innocent people, it seems that the same few questions are bounced around in the news, on social media, and in our everyday conversations: Who has the right to own a gun? Or, who has the right to use a gun, and when should a gun be used? Better yet, why does/should one use a gun? Unforgiven asks these questions too, but its ending with Munny’s successful and bloody revenge quest, something that will cement both his legend and the eternal blackness of his soul, muddies the waters of the gun control debate: Sure, guns are dangerous, but how was Munny supposed to protect himself against the corrupt and armed Little Bill unless he had a weapon of equal or greater fire power?

Furthermore, the film actually draws parallels between Munny and Little Bill. In addition to the fact that they share the same first name, both characters emphasize (in very similar language) that it takes a certain something to look down the barrel of a gun at one’s fellow man/woman and pull the trigger. That “something” is definitely not a positive thing, as we see after the Kid’s killing of the cowboy. It doesn’t seem to matter if the one who is armed is also wearing a badge of authority or not. One man can be as corrupt as the next, and it is the inside of a man that determines if/how he uses a weapon–whether that weapon is a gun or a knife or his own fist. It also doesn’t seem to make a difference if one kills a scum bag or an innocent bystander. The act of eliminating another person–whoever that person is and whether or not his/her death is justifiable–is something that scars the soul forever.

With all its storytelling of gun-slinging legends (there is a lot of emphasis on myth and reputation in the film), Unforgiven does the opposite of glorify gun violence. Even though Munny “gets aways with” his revenge killings at the close of the film, we know what his final end will be because before he dies Little Bill tells Munny that he will see him in Hell–and Munny agrees that this will be so. Both men are killers, one “legally” and the other not so much. But both are unforgiven because they are unrepentant of their crimes. Taking a human life–in any way, says the film–is so atrocious an act that there is no real hope for those who dare to do so, for those who can pull the trigger.

In real life, on the contrary, there is hope for people to escape their evil pasts and corrupt presents. Jesus Christ offers new life to those who are truly repentant of the bad deeds they have done. Munny doesn’t find this freedom from his past, though for most of the film he believes he has. The problem is that he has put his faith in people–in his wife to reform him and in himself to be able to resist the temptation to drink and kill–in order to turn his life around. But his wife dies, and his humanity is weak. He can’t save himself, and in the end he owns–and revels in–the actuality of what the legends say about him: he is brutal, murderous, and self-condemned–regardless of his weapon of choice.

On May 19, 1992, 17-year-old Amy Fisher walked up to the Massapequa, New York, house that belonged to her married lover, 35-year-old Joey Buttafuoco. When Joey’s wife, Mary Jo, answered the door, Fisher treated her to a concocted story about her even younger (and non-existent) sister having an affair with Mary Jo’s husband–and then shot Mary Jo once in the head.

Not even a month prior to this “Long Island Lolita Incident,” four white Los Angeles police officers were acquitted of assault charges after having been videotaped viciously beating Rodney King, a black man pulled over for a traffic violation. The acquittal sparked intense rage and violence in cities across the U.S. and led to the L.A. Riots in which more than 3,000 fires were started, over 50 people were killed, about 4,000 were injured, and approximately 12,000 were arrested.

Both Mary Jo Buttafuoco and Rodney King survived their attackers, but their assaults were, sadly, just a couple of notable occurrences of violence in a year that saw a film that is also preoccupied with violence win the Academy’s highest award. Although New York and L.A. are certainly not part of the Wild West that features so prominently in Unforgiven (1992; Warner Bros. Production, Warner Bros.), the film’s focus on intoxication and its consequences, gun possession/violence, murder for hire/conspiracy, and police corruption/brutality echoes in the real-life events of both the year of the film’s release and our own present time. Unforgiven asks what it takes to kill another human being–and what that act costs the killer. It examines the role–or, maybe “plight” is a better word–of women in society. It looks at how people are haunted by their pasts and how we cannot escape our previous deeds. It explores what defines each of us as human beings.

Unforgiven beat out major BP contenders such as A Few Good Men and Scent of a Woman to take home Oscar’s big prize. All in all, it won four Academy Awards out of nine nominations: Film Editing, Actor in a Supporting Role for Gene Hackman as Little Bill Daggett, Directing for Clint Eastwood (who became one of only a handful of actors to win an Oscar for his work behind the camera, a feat he would repeat in 2004 with BP Million Dollar Baby), and Best Picture. It failed to win in the categories of Art Direction, Cinematography, Sound, Writing (Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen), and Actor in a Leading Role for Clint Eastwood as Bill Munny.

Unforgiven was only the third Western film to win Best Picture, after 1930/31’s Cimarron and 1990’s Dances with Wolves, and it opts for the approach of the latter more than that of the former–attempting to picture the West as it actually was, rather than creating an idealized form of the American frontier. The result is visually stunning, but morally disturbing at parts–two facts that undoubtedly contributed to both the complexity of the film as well as its Oscar success.

For more thoughts on Unforgiven and its significance, please check out this weekend’s post!

On this Father’s Day, let’s talk horror. By definition, horror movies are films that are “calculated to cause intense repugnance, fear, or dread”; they “may incorporate incidents of physical violence and psychological terror” and “may be studies of deformed, disturbed, psychotic, or evil characters; stories of terrifying monsters or malevolent animals; or mystery thrillers that use atmosphere to build suspense.”  While most critics would agree that The Silence of the Lambs fulfills enough of this definition to qualify as a horror film, its sole purpose is not to simply terrify or repulse its audience. In fact, like many of the other BP winners of the late twentieth century, The Silence of the Lambs is about freedom.

Throughout the film there are obvious situations in which various characters find themselves imprisoned and/or restrained. Dr. Hannibal (the cannibal) Lecter is confined to a subterranean cell at the beginning of the film, a straight jacket (with the now-famous mask) later on, and a giant bird cage of sorts when he effects his escape. Catherine Martin, the young woman Clarice Starling and the FBI desperately seek to save from “Buffalo Bill” the serial killer, first becomes Bill’s prisoner when he tricks her into his van, then is held captive in a dry well beneath his house.

In addition to these blatant examples of confinement, more characters experience other forms of bondage. Buffalo Bill himself, a.k.a. Jame Gumb, believes he is a woman trapped in a man’s body. Lecter is constrained to obey his desire for blood and death. Starling is imprisoned, so to speak, by the traumatic events of her childhood, specifically the murder of her father and her witnessing the slaughter of spring lambs by the farmer she has been sent to live with after her father’s death. She tells Lecter that she, now as an adult, can still hear the lambs screaming. And the moths that feature so symbolically in the film are themselves captives of their own cocoons before they reach adulthood.

The Silence of the Lambs uses these instances of imprisonment to set up images of freedom–and also to ask questions about how freedom can be attained and what it means to truly have freedom. In Buffalo Bill’s distorted thoughts, deliverance from his captivity in a male body will be possible after he kills enough women to make a “woman suit” out of their skins. One wonders, though, if it will be possible for Bill to ever kill “enough” women. He seems to hate them, even refusing to gender-ize them (he refers to Catherine as “it”)–perhaps because they are what he cannot be. (Spoiler alert!) Thanks to Starling and the FBI, Bill doesn’t get to experience what he sees as freedom. He dies in a way that is as violent as he lived.

For Hannibal Lecter, as well as for Catherine Martin, freedom is a physical state. The way Lecter revoltingly displays the body of one of the guards he kills (the guard is spreadeagled and draped with a cloth so as to look like he’s flying out of the cage) is just a mockery of freedom. Lecter escapes the cage, but the fact that he has to hide (or deny) his own identity by literally covering his face with that of another guard indicates that Lecter is not truly liberated. He may be physically free, but he is not free of what actually binds him–his evil desires to kill and eat his fellow human beings. For Catherine, the other physically liberated character in the film, her own ingenuity and determination to survive contribute to her freedom. She was a captive, but she fought her captor, and she wins in the end. The viewer can believe that somehow she will end up stronger for her horrifying ordeal and brush with death.

For Starling, though, the film version of The Silence of the Lambs is a little ambiguous as to her achieving her freedom. Her haunting by the screaming of the lambs being slaughtered is definitely a driving force in her quest to save other helpless victims (like Catherine, who ironically turns out not to be that helpless). But at the end of the film when she receives a congratulatory phone call from Lecter on the occasion of her graduation from the FBI Academy, the escaped killer asks her if the lambs have stopped screaming; and Starling doesn’t answer this question. The novel assures its readers that after Catherine’s liberation Starling sleeps “in the silence of the lambs,” but the movie leaves its viewers wondering if rescuing one woman will be enough to undo the damage of Starling’s childhood and give her the freedom she craves.

For Me Then…

As I mentioned when we were talking about Get Out last year, I’m not a huge horror film fan, but I do appreciate a film that makes me think. The Silence of the Lambs certainly challenges one’s mind, so it definitely didn’t sink to the bottom of my BP rankings list. That being said, I feel that the film blurs the line between good and evil (which I don’t like). Clearly, murder and cannibalism are wrong, but Hannibal Lecter has become such an iconic bad guy that the true horror of who he is supposed to be and what he does can be lost on viewers. For instance, the movie attempts to end on a humorous note when Lecter tells Starling (while calling her from some tropical country) that he is “having an old friend for dinner,” meaning, of course, that he is going to kill and eat someone (the creepy Dr. Frederick Chilton who tormented Lecter while he was a prisoner in Chilton’s “care”). In reality, this statement is (or should be) revolting. At least partly, I think we can blame Anthony Hopkins’s brilliant performance for why we somehow sympathize or gravitate toward Lecter. But for whatever reason, Lecter comes across as semi-likable, and that’s just sick.

Still, if we go back to the idea that the film focuses on freedom, Lecter’s final words to Starling are even more revealing of his character–and of the human condition. As the movie presents examples of imprisonment and freedom, it also asks the question of what one should do once one has attained the freedom one desires. In the characters of Catherine and Starling–empowered female characters–we see two people who choose to pursue right once their freedom has been secured. Catherine cuddles Buffalo Bill’s “orphaned” poodle as she is escorted from his house. Although earlier in the film the dog is somewhat pictured as an accessory to Bill’s holding Catherine against her will, in the end Catherine sees the dog as a victim as well, a victim that she, in her newfound strength, can nurse back to health and goodness. In Starling’s case, the cessation of the lambs’ screaming should allow her to embark on a career of saving people. We see her graduate and become an FBI agent; and despite the film’s not confirming that she has made peace with the events of her childhood, we viewers have hope that the rest of her life will be positive (just don’t read/watch the sequel…). But for Lecter, the physical freedom he gains simply allows him to recommence his crimes. He is still in a prison of his own making. Hence, true freedom, says the film, isn’t dependent on where one finds oneself physically. Freedom is, at least in part, of one’s own making. Plus, it is deeply tied to morality. One cannot be free and devour one’s fellow humans. To wallow in evil is to not be free at all. In this sense, Lecter is terrifying, for his absolute disregard for humanity leaves him in peril of being a prisoner to his sin forever. And that is a horrifying reality.