Enough Movies

Image: http://www.cartoonstock.com

Sometimes you make a statement about your life only to have someone older say: I've seen enough in my life to know it isn't so.

A practical example would be: 

Young Person: I met with this guy a few times. And we talk every night until two am, but it's 100% platonic.

Older Person: Darling, I have lived long enough to know there are no real platonic relationships.

I heard something recently which totally blew my mind. 

I told someone about a dilemma in a relationship that I was experiencing. 

And the response was: "I have seen enough movies to know that life doesn't turn out a certain way."

Oh My Word, for real? Enough movies?

Are movies meant to copy our lives or are our lives mimicking movies?

Splitting Souls

The brilliance of Harry Potter continues to astound me every time I think of it. 

I saw the last movie today and was thoroughly impressed. 

It did justice to the book. 

The idea of horcruxes invented by J.K. Rowling is extremely profound. 

Voldemort wants to live forever and become immortal, so he splits his soul into seven different parts, each part placed in an object meaningful to him-that is the horcrux- and hides them across the world. 

Aren't we all a little bit Voldemortarian in that way?

As we live our lives, we leave parts of our soul with our past experiences, thereby multiplying our existence and becoming slightly more immortal.

 

For even if we die, the parts of us left behind will live on. 

Sarah's Key

There are times when going to movie theaters alone can be a powerful experience.
There is no one to be conscious of, no one to be considerate of, in a way, it is one of the most selfish things I have experienced recently.
After inviting a couple of friends to come with me to a movie about the Holocaust and being declined over and over. The most common excuse I heard was: I don't do movies in the three weeks.
Like hello, this is the Holocaust... you aren't going to come out feeling jolly or anything.

I really wanted to see the movie so I decided to go alone.
It was such an interesting experience. In a small and beautiful movie theater called the Paris theater, I sat alone and cried over the fate of French Jews who were delivered to the Nazis by their own neighboring Frenchmen.

The story of a girl who tried to save her brother, but failed, felt the guilt her entire lifetime, and eventually took her own life to rid herself of the tragedy she lived through.
The story of a woman searching for some meaning, for some recognition of the past and how that search changed her life and the life of a baby her husband wanted to abort.

A sad story, beautifully delivered through words and images.

Never In The Present Always In The Past

There is this dumpy crumpy theater on the Upper West Side which shows the weirdest movies in the world. I love it.
This week I went to see "Midnight in Paris". I laughed the entire time.
A romantic comedy filled with intrigue, humor, a cool plot, not too heavy. Amazing.

This guy loves Paris, it is filled with meaning for him. As happy as he is to be in Paris in 2010, he dreams of Paris in the 1920's when his heroes lived.

Lo and behold, his dream comes true. He is in Paris in 1920 surrounded by great figured such as S. Dali, P. Picasso, Hemingway and others.
He is inhaling every moment and enjoying the present which is actually the past.

Until he meets a beauty that is. The beauty dreams of Paris in the 1890's. As they recoil back into the 1800's they realize that the people living then wish they lived in the times of the Renneisance.

And that is precisely when our hero realizes that by dwelling on the past, he forgets to recognize the present.

He leaves his beauty of the 1920's in the 1890's, where she wishes to remain, and instead of returning to his favorite era of the 1920's, he goes to 2010 where he belongs and finds a beauty of his day to walk with him in Paris. In the rain.

And that is my the movie spoke to me, my friend. Because I am stuck. Stuck in what was. And I must move on to what is.