When I hear the word “plastics” in connection with movies, I immediately think of two: The Graduate, where the neighbor of Ben Braddock (played by Dustin Hoffman) advises him that plastics are the key to a financially successful future, and Mean Girls, where the most-popular girls in the high school are referred to as the Plastics, which is really a reflection of their personalities. With school starting again, maybe it’s time to sit down with our high school age kids or grandchildren and watch or re-watch Mean Girls.

Looking back at my own high school experience, I tried my best to be accepted, even popular, with the “right” (meaning cool) crowd. By my senior year, though, that popularity and acceptance became less important to me, as I realized there really was life after high school, and that to be part of the cool crowd, you often had to give up your individuality by talking, dressing and acting (whether genuine of not) like everyone else in that crowd. The saddest thing, though, is cool crowds are often not that cool, because to become a member, you sometimes have to ignore, put down, and even belittle anyone outside the clique. I think what really happened to me in high school was, somewhere along the way, I realized I was OK with myself; that if I kept worrying about what other people thought of me, I was showing more confidence in their opinion than I had in my own.

I learned two important lessons from watching Mean Girls, where Cady Heron (played by Lindsay Lohan) attends public school for the first time. Previously, she had lived with her parents in Africa and was home schooled. At her new school, she befriends Janis and Damian, who warn her to avoid the Plastics, a clique of three rich girls, who reached queen bee status by bullying and gossiping about anyone who got in their way. But the Plastics take an interest in Cady, so Cady, Janis and Damian devise a plot for Cady to be assimilated into the clique for the purpose of bringing them down. The plan is working, except the Plastics have changed Cady. In this scene, Janis confronts Cady about not just becoming a part of the clique, but about actually becoming plastic:

It is sad that sometimes we think the only way we can be a part of a group or feel good about ourselves is by putting others down. It is especially sad when those put downs are based on hearsay or even lies. So the first lesson I learned from Mean Girls is to accept yourself for who your really are, despite what others might think about you. I love the character of Janis because, although different from most of the other students at school, she was comfortable with herself. Her message to all of us? Of all the different opinions people might have about you, the most important opinion is the one you have of yourself.

As a member of the Plastics clique, Cady learns of a “Burn Book,” a secret notebook kept by the Plastics containing rumors, secrets and gossip about other students and teachers at the school. As an act of revenge, the leader of the Plastics makes copies of the Burn Book and spreads its pages throughout the school. The result is chaos, distrust, shunning, and dissolved relationships that are not easily healed. Lesson two from Mean Girls, then, is really a corollary of lesson one: if we have a positive image of ourselves, we have no need to put down others, and worse, if we do engage in gossip, we are on a road of no return, for once the lies and putdowns are out in the open, there is no chance of taking them back.

One of the greatest demonstrations of the consequences of gossiping is found in this sermon delivered by Father Brendan Flynn (played by the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman) in the movie, Doubt***:

 Whether at home, school or work, let’s remember the word told Ben Braddock in The Graduate: plastics; not so much as a road map to financial success, but as a reminder to cultivate a powerful image of ourselves, and a warning against cruelty to others.

Postscript to “Winning with Class” (my previous post on this blog): a terrific example of winning without any class is the recent movie, The Program****. It is the story of Lance Armstrong, America’s favorite and best-known cyclist, and how he won seven Tour De France competitions by cheating. Armstrong is still America’s best-known cyclist, but now he might be the world’s least favorite one.

*The Graduate

Production: MGM

Director: Mike Nichols

Screenwriter: Calder Willingham and Buck Henry (adapted from the book by Charles Webb)

Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft and Katharine Ross

Released: December 22, 1967

**Mean Girls

Production: Paramount Pictures

Director: Mark Waters

Screenwriter: Tina Fey (adapted from the book by Rosalind Wiseman)

Starring: Lindsay Lohan, Jonathan Bennett and Rachel McAdams

Released: April 30, 2004

***Doubt:

Production: Miramax

Director: John Patrick Shanley

Screenwriter: John Patrick Shanley

Starring: Meryl Streep, Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams

Released: December 25, 2008

The Program:

Production: Anton Capital Entertainment, StudioCanal, Working Title Films

Director: Stephen Frears

Screenwriter: John Hodge (adapted from the book by David Walsh)

Starring: Ben Foster, Chris O’Dowd and Jesse Plemons

Released: March 18, 2016

I admit it, I’m an Olympics junkie. The real life drama of the games matches even the best dramatic movie. I tensed up every time the remarkable USA women’s gymnastics team went to stick a landing (you know, Gymnastics 101: fly high and stick the landing). I teared up along with Simone Manual as she came from behind to win the women’s 100 meter freestyle to become the first African-American to win a gold medal in swimming. My jaw dropped as I watched Joseph Schooling beat out Michael Phelps (and two other top, better known, swimmers) to win the men’s 100 meter butterfly, earning Singapore’s first gold medal in swimming – ever. And who didn’t smile when you saw the photo of Joseph Schooling, as a boy, with his Olympic hero Michael Phelps?

How did Phelps, the winner of 28 Olympic medals, 23 of which are gold, react to being beaten by someone he was a hero to? “I’m sure we’ve all seen the photo of Katie [Ledecky] and I when she was 9, 10 and the photo of Joe [Schooling] and I…. Being able to have that opportunity to change the sport and continue to change the sport is something I am looking forward to. Daring kids to dream, that’s the only reason why I’m sitting here. I was a little kid with a dream and it turned into a couple of medals, pretty good couple of years of swimming and I had a blast. So the more kids I can … help … just believe in themselves. Not to be afraid to know that the sky is the limit.”

The drama, though, didn’t always stay in the pool. I nodded in agreement when Lily King, the winner of the women’s 100 meter breaststroke, spoke to her biggest challenger, Yulia Efimova, who has tested positive five times for performance enhancement drugs: “You’ve been caught for drug cheating – I’m just not a fan.”  It’s interesting that this Olympic event occurred during the same week that Alex Rodriguez, who has repeatedly been suspended for using performance enhancing drugs, announced his retirement from baseball.

Written across the top of the gymnasium where my kids played high school basketball are the words, “Winning With Class.” I have always been impressed with that. In a sports world where in-your-face trash-talking has become the norm, I still (and always will) root for the humble athlete who is grateful for his or her God-given abilities and acknowledges greatness in the competition; who realize that winning against the competition is not as important as winning against yourself – putting in the time and effort to become the best athlete you can be. What does an athlete who wins a gold medal by using performance enhancing drugs really win? Maybe some hardware, but in my opinion, at the cost of one’s self-respect.

The movie, Without Limits,* is the true-life story of Steve Prefontaine, an American long distance runner who competed in the 1972 Olympics. He held the American records in seven different long-distance track events, from the 2,000 meters to the 10,000 meters, but who was tragically killed in a automobile accident at age 24. The eulogy given by his college coach Bill Bowerman (played by Donald Sutherland) summarizes the mind and heart of a true champion, in that how you win is more important than if you win:

  One of the best movies about the Olympics is Chariots of Fire,** which won the Oscar for best picture in 1982. It is the true story about two British sprinters who competed in the 1924 Olympics. Neither were favored in their respective events, but both won gold medals. Harold Abrahams uses his speed to overcomes obstacles he faced as a Jew. Eric Liddell, a devout Christian missionary in China, uses his running as an additional way to spread God’s word. In a key scene, using the background of the men’s 400 meters, a race he hadn’t even trained for, Eric explains why he runs to his sister, Jennie, who thinks Eric’s running only takes time away from his true calling:

Similarly, in the movie, Eddie the Eagle,*** Michael “Eddie” Edwards, the ultimate underdog, never stopped believing in himself. He takes on, first, the ski jump, then, the sports and political establishment, to earn a spot on Great Britain’s team at the 1988 Calgary Olympics. Eddie  knew he could never win an Olympic medal. Just making the team was good enough.

We should consider winning in life to be the same as winning in sports – the how we win is just as important as if we win. In the movie, The Rainmaker,**** young lawyer, Rudy Baker, realizes this when he says, “Every lawyer, at least once in every case, feels himself crossing a line that he doesn’t really mean to cross… it just happens… And if you cross it [the line] enough times it disappears forever. And then you’re nothin’ but another lawyer joke. Just another shark in the dirty water.”

Each of us has been blessed with some kind of talent or ability. Let’s be passionate about that ability, whatever it is, as we try to win the sport that is life. But let’s win with class – with humility, with respect for the competition, and with gratitude that we have been blessed with the abilities and opportunities we have. Some of us might become stars, like an Olympic champion. Others of us might be destined to just make the squad. But in either event, winning with class makes true winners of us all.

*Without Limits

Production: Cruise/Wagner Productions

Directed: Robert Towne

Screenplay: Robert Towne and Kenny Moore

Starring: Billy Crudup, Donald Sutherland and Monica Potter

Release Date: September 11, 1998

**Chariots of Fire

Production:

Directed: Hugh Hudson

Screenplay: Colin Welland

Starring: Ben Cross, Ian Charleston, Nicholas Farrell

Release Date: April 9, 1982

***Eddie the Eagle

Production: Marv Films, Saville Productions and Studio Babelsberg

Directed: Dexter Fletcher

Screenplay: Sean Macauley

Starring: Taron Egerton and Hugh Jackman

Release Date: February 26, 2016

****The Rainmaker

Production: Constellation entertainment, Douglas/Reuther Productions and American Zoetrope

Directed: Francis Ford Coppola

Screenplay: John Grisham and Francis Ford Coppola

Starring:  Matt Damon, Danny DeVito and Claire Danes

Release Date: November 21, 1997

There is an old saying: “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” Elephants are synonymous with being big. We have elephant ears and there’s an elephant in the room. Similarly, I believe in having big, elephant dreams. But sometimes those dreams can be overwhelming, and our failure in trying to reach our big dreams leads to discouragement and despair, which can paralyze us.

The Mask of Zorro* is a fun movie depicting the legend of Zorro (and you thought I was going to write about Dumbo!). That legend has Zorro traveling through the southwest of the United States righting wrongs, fighting evil, and, of course, attracting women. He may have been the original superhero. But Zorro was not always a gallant swashbuckler. The movie portrays the young Zorro as foolhardy and ineffective at his quest to foil villains. He attempts great feats, but the higher he flies, the farther he falls. And the more he falls, the more he feels as if the world around him is out of control.

But an old mentor, Don Diego, is there to save the day. He takes the young Zorro (still known as Alejandro at this point) who is suffering from drinking and despair, and begins to mold him, promising him that with dedication and time, Alejandro can be the master of his own fate. In a hidden cave, Don Diego places Alejandro within a small circle and tells him, “This circle will be your world. Your whole life. Until I tell you otherwise, there is nothing outside of it.” Here is a clip of this important scene from the movie:

Once Alejandro is able to master his new world (the small circle), Don Diego slowly, but steadily, increases the size of Alejandro’s world, and allows him to tackle greater and greater feats until he has become the legend that is Zorro. But without mastering that first circle, Alejandro had no control over his world – no real skill, no faith in his abilities, and no chance of reaching his dreams. In short, before Zorro could eat his big elephant of dreams, he had to chew it up one bite at a time.

Shawn Achor, in one of my favorite books, The Happiness Advantage**, talks about the “Zorro Circle” or a person’s circle of control. Achor states, “One of the biggest drivers of success is the belief that our behavior matters; that we have control over our future…. By first limiting the scope of our efforts, then watching those efforts have the intended effect, we accumulate the resources, knowledge and confidence to expand the circle, gradually conquering a larger and larger area.”

Anchor describes two interesting studies about people who feel they are in control (whether or not they actually are). In one study of 7,400 employees, those who believed they had little or no control over deadlines imposed by their supervisors or others had a 50 percent higher risk of heart disease than those who believed they maintained some control. In fact, the researchers concluded that feeling a lack of control at work is as great a risk factor for heart disease as high blood pressure.

In the other study, researchers found that, when they gave a group of nursing home residents more control over their daily lives – even something as simple as being in charge of their own house plants – their mortality rate actually dropped in half (and their happiness levels increased).

So dream dreams as big as elephants, but achieve those dreams one bite at a time. Starting wherever you’re at, find something over which you can exercise control, whether it’s as complex as running a multinational corporation, or as simple as planning tonight’s dinner. And as the clip of Zorro shows, sometimes you need to start out slowly, and very small, even as small as what is really inside your heart. But taking control of our circles, large or small, will make our lives more fulfilling – and happier. Who knows, maybe each of us will be able to unleash the Zorro inside of us, and be legends, if only in our own minds. But in our own minds is really all that matters.

_______________________________

*The Mask of Zorro

Production: TriStar Pictures, Amblin Entertainment, David Foster Productions

Director: Martin Campbell

Screenwriter: Johnston McCulley and Ted Elliott

Starring: Antonio Banderas, Anthony Hopkins and Catherine Zeta-Jones

Released: July 17, 1998

**Achor, The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles, Crown Business, 2010

            It has been a hard week for the Dallas – Fort Worth area, as Micah Johnson, a black, former military reservist, shot and killed five Dallas police officers, apparently in response to shootings involving police officers and African-Americans in Minnesota and Louisiana. In all, Johnson killed five officers and wounded seven others, along with two civilians. Johnson claimed he hated white people, especially police officers, and decided to do something about it. The carnage finally ended when Dallas police detonated a robot armed with explosives, killing Johnson.

            Now it is time for us to do something about it. According to The Washington Post, 509 people have been shot by police in the United States so far this year. According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, the Dallas shootings brought the number of law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty so far in 2016 to 56. So what can we do to stop this? There are no easy answers. No doubt there are police officers of every race and ethnicity who abuse the power of their badges. No doubt there are bad actors of every race and ethnicity who are a menace to society and who the police rightfully should be wary of. But the continued killing of African-Americans and police officers only breeds fear, which will lead to more shootings – and more deaths.

            “I hate white people,” reminds me of an experience I had in high school. I was talking with friends in the hall when my drama teacher walked by. She overheard me commenting that I “hated” a certain person. She stopped, turned to me, and pointed a finger at my nose and said, “There is no person in this world that you hate. If you think you feel that way, it is only because you don’t know that person well enough. If you would make the effort to get to know them, where they are coming from and why they do what they do, you might not end up being best friends, but you will at least end up respecting them for who they are.” Could improving race relations be as simple as that?

            Movies have taken on race relations for many years, and I have learned important lessons from them. Here are three of them:

            1.      Always try to see the circumstances from the other person’s viewpoint, or as Atticus Finch would say in To Kill a Mockingbird, don’t make judgments until you have walked around in another person’s shoes for a while. A Time to Kill* is the story of a young lawyer’s defense of a black man accused of murdering two men who raped his 10-year-old daughter. Here is a great scene from the movie that reminds us look at situations from a different perspective:

            2.      Never let peer pressure or social status influence how you really feel about someone. The Help** is set during the civil rights movement of the 1960s, and through the eyes of an aspiring writer, focuses on African-American maids who work for white families. Incredibly, those white families allowed their African-American maids to essentially raise their children, but won’t allow them to use the same toilets as they do. Here is one of my favorite scenes from the movie:

            3.      A person should be judged on who they are, not the color of their skin. This lesson is taught well in a locker room scene near the end of Remember the Titans***, the true story of a newly-appointed African-American high school football coach dealing with the first year of racial integration of the school:

            None of us individually will be able to solve the issues of race facing this country. But each of us can make a contribution by better understanding those we come in contact with each day, regardless of their color, ethnicity, religious affiliations, or political beliefs. Graeme Edge of the Moody Blues (yes, I’m that old), said it better than I could in his poem, The Balance. Notice he starts by looking at what he might have done to others, not what others had done to him:

And he thought of those he’d angered                                                                                                 For he was not a violent man.                                                                                                                And he thought of those he’d hurt                                                                                                         For he was not a cruel man.                                                                                                                     And he thought of those he’d frightened                                                                                             For he was not an evil man.                                                                                                                    And he understood.                                                                                                                                      He understood himself.                                                                                                                         Upon this, he saw that when he was of anger                                                                                      Or knew hurt or felt fear,                                                                                                                               It was because he was not understanding.                                                                                          And he learned compassion                                                                                                                     And with his eye of compassion,                                                                                                             He saw his enemies like unto himself.                                                                                                 And he learned love.

            Let’s be compassionate about becoming part of the solution rather than part of the problem. Maybe an easy place to start is by watching – and thinking about – movies that deal candidly with race. Here, in no particular order, are a baker’s dozen of my favorites:

1. To Kill a Mockingbird
2. The Help
3. Remember the Titans
4. A Time to Kill
5. 12 Years a Slave
6. Glory
7. Fruitvale Station
8. Gran Torino
9. Crash
10. In the Heat of the Night
11. Malcolm X
12. 42
13. The Long Walk Home

            The world needs less fear, and a lot more more understanding; less anger, and a lot more respect; less hate, and a lot more love. Let’s not let race divide us, for all lives matter.

*A Time to Kill

Production: Regency Enterprises and Warner Bros.                                                             Directed: Joel Schumacher                                                                                                         Screenplay: Akiva Goldsman (adapted from the novel by John Grisham)                       Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Sandra Bullock, Samuel L. Jackson                                Release date: July 26, 1996

**The Help

Production: Dreamworks SKG, Reliance Entertainment, Participant Media                 Directed: Tate Taylor                                                                                                                    Screenplay: Tate Taylor (adapted from the novel by Kathryn Stockett)                          Starring: Emma Stone, Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer                                                         Release date: August 10, 2011

***Remember the Titans

Production: Jerry Bruckheimer Films, Run It Up Productions Inc., Technical Black, Walt Disney Pictures                                                                                                                                  Directed: Boaz Yakin                                                                                                                    Screenplay: Gregory Allen Howard                                                                                              Starring: Denzel Washington, Will Patton, Wood Harris                                                       Release date:  September 29, 2000

There are two topics you are never supposed to discuss because they usually lead to arguments: politics and religion. Although I graduated in political science on my way to law school, I became disillusioned with politics many years ago. I currently believe that, regardless of which party’s candidate is elected president, nothing will ever change much because both parties are hell-bent in defeating the agenda of the opposition by standing on “principle.” Religion is often the same. Regardless of your faith (or lack thereof), each of us is convinced that our way is the right way, and no amount of logic, reasoning or arguing the “truth” will convince us otherwise. And so we create litmus tests and draw lines in the sand regarding our truths, and warn others not to fail that test or cross that line if they want to be “one of us.”

The movie, Sophie’s Choice*, came out in 1982. I can’t remember much about the movie, other than Sophie, played by Meryl Streep, is a troubled woman. The one scene I will always remember, though, is near the end of the film when we learn why Sophie is so troubled. Sent to a Jewish concentration camp, she is required by a guard to pick which of her two children will be spared and which one must go to the gas chamber. If she refuses to pick one, the guard threatens to send both of her children to their deaths. So Sophie chooses her son over her daughter. Few scenes in any movie are more gut-wrenching than hearing Sophie’s little girl scream and call for her mother as the guards carry her away to her death. Here is the scene:

While not as dramatic as being held prisoner at gunpoint, do we sometimes put others in the position of having to make a Sophie’s choice? Sadly, many a family member or friend has been cast out because of religious or political beliefs, as we force them to sacrifice their principles or beliefs for inclusion in the group, or to sacrifice being part of the group to maintain their beliefs. I am all for principle, and standing up for what you believe. But that does not mean we cannot listen to, understand, and most importantly, respect the principles and positions of others. If we are going to fight for principle, let that principle be that everyone has the right to their own opinions and beliefs and should be respected for them, whether we agree with them or not.

Recently I have enjoyed listening to the music from the Broadway musical, Hamilton (since it is all but impossible to actually see it without taking out a mortgage to pay for overpriced tickets). One theme that has impressed me about Hamilton is how much our beloved Founding Fathers disagreed, argued, and yes, even fought with each other. But without giving up their principles and beliefs, they found a way to form a constitution and make a government work. The Founding Fathers developed the art of compromise: the process of giving and taking, changing and adjusting. They remained principled, yet practical. In fact, anyone who knows much about U.S. history acknowledges that the U.S. Constitution is largely the result of a series of compromises.

            Perhaps I am too idealistic to think that people today could effectively compromise when it comes to politics and religion (or just about any other topic). But we can avoid putting people in positions where they must make a Sophie’s choice. Let’s not lose a friend or a family member because he or she is Republican, Democrat, Socialist or Libertarian, or Catholic, born-again Christian, Mormon, Jew or atheist, or even because of one’s sexual preference.

            It all starts with tolerance. That word sometimes has a negative connotation, as it implies that we are right and the person we tolerate is wrong. But I think tolerance includes respect. Tolerance (and respect} leads to listening, which leads to understanding, which ultimately leads to love.

            I believe we can learn to truly love and respect the “sinner” without loving the “sin.” By doing so, there will be a lot less Sophie’s choices being made.

*Sophie’s Choice

            Production: Incorporated Television Company; Keith Barish Productions

            Directed: Alan J. Pakula

            Screenplay: William Styron and Alan J. Pakula

            Starring: Meryl Streep; Kevin Kline; and Peter McNichol

Tragedy strikes us all. It is a question of when, not if. And so, tragedy will strike those we love, those we care about, again and again. Some of the hardest things we must do in this life is to help family, friends, neighbors and even total strangers deal with a death, an accident, an illness or some other tragic event. We want to help. We want to ease pain. We want to show love. But most of the time, we don’t know what to say or do, and our feeble attempts at mourning, comforting or helping often do more harm than good.  Since we are unsure what to say to the person in crisis, we say things that help us more than them.

            A gem of a movie, that unfortunately few people ever saw, teaches us a great lesson here. Lars and the Real Girl* is purportedly about a shy, socially backward young man (Lars, wonderfully played by Ryan Gosling), who has difficulty with relationships in general, let alone knowing how to effectively deal with the opposite sex. So in part to get his sister-in-law off his back, he brings his new girlfriend to meet the family. There is only one problem. The girlfriend is not real; she is an anatomically correct, life-sized, blow-up doll named Bianca ordered off the internet. Here is the hilarious scene from the movie where Lars introduces his girlfriend to his brother and sister-in-law.

            But Lars and the Real Girl is not really about sexy blow-up dolls. It is the touching story of how a community joins together to help a young man deal with and conquer his demons. At first they laugh at him and his doll, but then realize they are not all that different from Lars, as each of them acknowledges their own quirks and issues. And as they learn to love and accept Lars, they learn to love and accept Bianca as if she were real, for in Lars’ mind, she is. Over time, Lars learns to deal rationally with real people, and as he does so, his need to rely on Bianca lessens. Bianca ultimately comes down with a terminal illness. As Bianca teeters on death’s door, Lars is visited by friends and neighbors in this scene illustrating one of the best things we can do when tragedy strikes a loved one.

            “We came over to sit. That’s what people do when tragedy strikes. They come over to sit.” How true those words are – or at least they should be. In times of suffering, we often don’t need to say anything, really. Just bring our needlepoint, our knitting, and be with the person who is hurting.

            I recently heard some great advice on what to do for others who are mourning and in need of comfort. It’s called the three Hs to which I added a fourth:

            Hugs – you don’t need to say anything, just a simple gesture of love, like a hug will do. And remember, real men hug.

            Hang out – This is what the women in Lars and the Real Girl did. They just hung out. People in mourning or in crisis like and need to be around other people; they don’t necessary need or really want to interact with them.

            Hush up – Offering hollow platitudes don’t really help. For example, a person whose spouse suddenly dies leaving behind a stay-at-home mom with three children, one of them battling cancer and a stroke, does not really care to hear that “God must have needed him more on the other side.” Whether statements like that are true or not (as if we really know anyway) are not particularly comforting to the person who is wondering how God could have taken her husband at a time when she needed him most.

            Help – When you see something that needs to be done, step in and do it. Don’t ask if there is anything you can do to help, just do it. Often a person in crisis or tragedy is paralyzed. They know there are many things that need to be done, but they can’t remember most of them or even how to do them, if they do remember them at all. I have seen persons in time of crisis who can’t remember even how to use the phone. So make the calls for them. Arrange for food. Cut the lawn. Do something.

            A final thought. My sister suddenly died when she was 17 (I was 12 at the time) from a heart condition. Needless to say, my mother was devastated. Family, friends, neighbors and church members rallied around us – for about three weeks. Then their own lives took precedence again, and they largely disappeared. We were left alone. We don’t blame them, for life really does go on. But that was the hardest part for Mom – the time after the initial shock of the tragedy wore off. So go over and sit with friends in need. Just remember, people need us throughout the entire grieving process.

But for the grace of God go I.

*Lars and the Real Girl

Production: MGM, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, and Lars Productions

Directed: Craig Gilespie

Screenplay: Nancy Oliver

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Emily Mortimer, Paul Schneider and Patricia Clarkson

This Memorial Day, the remake of the classic 1977 miniseries, Roots[i], will begin airing on the History Channel. While Roots is not a movie in the traditional sense, I still remember the impact the original had on me – a white, middle-class American who went to high school with less than ten African Americans in a school of over a thousand. Roots showed me how cruel human beings can be to each other solely based on being unfortunate enough to be born with a different skin color in a time and place where slavery was common. But let’s save discrimination for another movie.

The title of this post is a quote from “Chicken” George at the end of the original Roots miniseries. George and his family pull their wagons into a beautiful Tennessee field and George announces, “We is free!” But was Chicken George really free? Are any of us? I don’t mean the political freedom guaranteed by the Constitution. I mean being totally free in the thoughts we harbor, the actions we take, or even in the persons we are or hope to become.

I was raised in a religion where agency, or freedom of choice, is an overarching principle. Whether you are good or bad or something in between is often seen to be purely based on the conscious decisions you make. You choose to be good and receive the promised blessings, or you choose to be bad, and end up in hell. I personally believe it is not quite that simple. No decision we make is made in a vacuum. Decisions are influenced by many factors, most of which are beyond our control.

One of the most gut-wrenching movies I have seen lately is a foreign language film entitled Run Boy Run.[ii]  It is the true story of an eight-year old Jewish boy in Poland during World War II. To protect him from being killed by Nazi soldiers, his dad sends him into the forest where he must learn to survive on his own, with the occasional help from a few sympathetic locals. Throughout the movie I was amazed at the lengths to which the Nazi soldiers would go in attempting to capture or kill this little boy, as if he somehow would make a difference in the outcome of the war. But, of course, the soldiers’ mission was not a military one as much as a social one, with the goal of eliminating an entire race of people. Here is the trailer from the movie:

That same week I saw another foreign language film entitled Labyrinth of Lies[iii], which tells the true story of Johann Radmann, a German prosecutor, who, beginning in 1958, seeks to bring to justice the German SS soldiers who committed grievous atrocities against the Jewish prisoners at Auschwitz. Radmann and his team focused on those who committed such atrocities on their own volition, and not those who were just “following orders.” Radmann and others were successful in convicting hundreds of SS soldiers, but a postscript at the end of the movie reveals that none of those convicted ever showed any real remorse for what they had done. Here is a clip from that movie where Radmann and part of his team learn for the first time the extent of what happened at Auschwitz:

            How could a group of soldiers have such hate against others, including children, to the point they would decide to commit such terrible acts against them? My father-in-law, who happened to have six children, liked to quote John Wilmont, who said, “Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children. Now I have six children and no theories.” I have five kids and my wife and I learned, almost from the day our children were born, they came to us preprogramed. All were raised in the same basic environment, with the same family rules, teachings and opportunities, but each came with their own unique personalities, qualities and abilities. As we have learned in connection with a lot of things about life, genetics (our natures) are major keys in how we will turn out. But how we are raised (or how we are nurtured) also plays a major role in the person we become. Our religious and political views, our likes and dislikes, our professions, how we treat others, and even how we speak and act, are more often than not the result of the influence of our ancestors, parents, siblings, friends and associates. When you combine our natures with how we were nurtured, by the time we reach adulthood, can we really say that we are entirely free to choose who we are?

            Please don’t get me wrong. I am not saying a person shouldn’t be held accountable for his or her actions. All of us should be. But perhaps how we treat people who do things that hurt others or themselves should be less about mere punishment and retribution and more about understanding, compassion, rehabilitation and prevention of similar acts in the future. Maybe that prevention should be centered in education and reprogramming. As we learn more and more about how our brains work – how our brains are constantly being rewired – I believe each of us can learn to better understand others and ourselves, and help others to change, along with ourselves. And maybe along the way we will learn a little more patience and understanding of those who aren’t doing anything wrong, but who choose to do things differently than we would.

            I am a big believer in the power of heritage – not just genetics, but understanding our own roots, and how our ancestors, although imperfect like us, accomplished great things. They might be our own direct ancestors or just other members of the human race. But in the final analysis, we are all one family, regardless of race, culture, sexual orientation, or economic standing. Alex Haley became a better person by learning of his roots. Here is a clip from the original Roots where Chicken George and his son, Tom, reflect on their heritage:

I hope all of us will learn from the character of our ancestors, share those heritage stories with our own children and grandchildren, and encourage them to do the same.

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[i] Roots

Production: David L. Wolper Productions; Warner Bros. Television

Directed: Marvin Chomsky; John Erman; David Greene; and Gilbert Moses

Screenplay: William Blinn; M. Charles Cohen; Alex Haley; Ernest Kinoy; and James Lee

Starring: LaVar Burton; John Amos; Leslie Uggams; Ben Vereen (and many others)

[ii] Run Boy Run

Production: Bittersuess Pictures

Directed: Pepe Danquart

Screenplay: Heinrich Hadding, Pepe Danquart

Starring: Andrzej Tkacz; Kamil Tkacz; Elisabeth Duda

[iii] Labyrinth of Lies

Production: Claussen Wőbke Putz Filmproduction; Naked Eye Filmproduction

Directed: Giulio Ricciarelli

Screenplay: Elisabeth Bartel; Giulio Ricciarelli

Starring: Andre Szymanski; Alexander Fehling; Frederike Becht

When it comes to movies, I generally prefer a good drama to a comedy, although I enjoy a good laugh as well as the next person. But sometimes I struggle with what’s really funny. Several years ago my wife and I went to see the musical, The Color Purple. I vaguely remembered seeing the movie several years previously, but I had never seen the stage play. I couldn’t remember much about the movie, other than it was directed by Steven Spielberg, and was a heavy drama. One of the characters in both the stage play and the movie is an African-American named Alphonso, who beats and rapes his daughter, Celie – repeatedly. Although a despicable character to me, the audience at the stage play, which was at least three-fourths African-American, continually burst into laughter at some of the things Alphonso did and said. I didn’t know what to do. Should I laugh along with the audience (although I didn’t find Alphonso the least bit funny)? If I did laugh, would my African-American neighbors find my laughter offensive since I “was not one of them.” And if I didn’t laugh at Alphonso, would those same African-Americans think we were racist? My wife and I left at intermission.  I don’t consider myself racist. It could have been any group regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, or political views and I would have felt the same.

I had a similar experience but from the other viewpoint a couple of years ago when I first saw the musical, The Book of Mormon. I happen to be a Mormon, and Mormons, for the most-part, have stayed away from the musical. So I was amazed at how the crowd around me laughed loud and long throughout the entire production. My first thought was, how could they even think this is funny when, being non-Mormons, they probably don’t even get most of the jokes? My second thought was, as non-Mormons, what gave them the right to laugh at me and my fellow Mormons?

I learned a great lesson about laughter from one of my favorite romantic comedies, Roxanne*, a modern take on Cyrano de Bergerac starring Steve Martin. The lesson: learn to laugh at yourself, and encourage others to laugh right along with you. Notice I said laugh along with, not laugh at. In Roxanne, C.D. Bales, our modern-day Cyrano, has the long nose, a gift for prose, and a great ability to laugh at himself. In a barroom confrontation, a man tries to insult C.D., but all he can come up with is “big nose.” C.D. then takes the challenge of coming up with twenty different insults about his nose, all of which far surpass “big nose.” Here is the scene from the movie.

Rather than hold a pity party because of his nose, C.D. Bales embraces his unique physical trait. And that made all the difference. And in the end, Roxanne falls in love with C.D. because of the complete person he is, despite his nose getting in the way – literally.

My father-in-law, Don Harris, was a remarkable man with a story remarkably similar to C.D. Bales. Rather than an extra-large nose, Don was legally deaf, the victim of swine flu when he was about two years old, when he lost about 90 percent of his hearing. Growing up without much hearing was not always easy, but Don always figured out how to get by. But as Don started those awkward years of puberty, his self-esteem, like so many other teenagers, was put to the test. In junior high, with different teachers for each class, Don found himself giving the right answers to the wrong questions. Whenever he did so, everyone thought it was funny. Everyone except Don. One day in gym class the teacher asked each student to repeat back their locker number. Don thought the teacher asked how tall he was. “Four foot eight,” he replied. The class fell apart with laughter. Don got mad. He stomped his foot. He cried. Finally he yelled, “Goodbye! I’m never coming back to this school again.”

Don ran all the way home. Fortunately, his mother was there. “Don, you’re home early.” He explained to her why. “Son, you’re going to have a lot of people laugh at you before you leave this life. We’ll take you to every doctor we know to try to get you some help for your hearing, but I suggest the next time you give the right answer to the wrong question and everyone laughs, you laugh right along with them. I’ll be hard the first time, but from then out, you’ll have it made.”

Don decided to give it a try. The next day at school a teacher asked a question and Don gave the wrong answer. Everyone burst into loud laughter. This time, instead of getting mad, Don laughed along with them. “That sure was a dilly, wasn’t,” he said, and everyone laughed again. And Don spent the rest of his life laughing at life’s hard knocks, and encouraging those around him to join in.

Whether we have a physical deformity, a character flaw, or just do silly things from time to time, being able to laugh at ourselves sometimes takes great courage. But the rewards are worth it, if only in the growth of our own self-esteem. As Ethel Barrymore once said, “You grow up the day you have your first real laugh – at yourself.” So go ahead. Take a look in the mirror, and let the good times roll.

*Roxanne

Production company: Columbia Pictures

Directed by: Fred Schepisi

Screenplay by: Steve Martin

Starring: Steve Martin and Darryl Hannah

I personally don’t like movies about superheroes that have extra-special powers because they came from a different planet, have special clothing or mutated genes. I like my heroes human, with their own set of human strengths and flaws.

Not too long ago I saw a movie entitled, Concussion*, which tells the story of Dr. Bennet Omalu, the forensic scientist who, after coming to America from Nigeria, helped identify a degenerative brain disease in American football players, starting with “Iron Mike” Webster, the All-Pro center for the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1974 to 1990, whose death at age 50 came after several years of mental disorder and malfunction. Dr. Omalu performed the autopsy on Mr. Webster, and discovered what he describes as killer proteins throughout his brain, a condition that became known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE. He (along with other doctors) published the findings in a medical journal, and then fought with the NFL to get the league to recognize the potential large scale, long-term problem it faces: humans are not built to play football. Others have picked up where Dr. Omalu left off in helping players and parents understand the potential danger from repeated contact required in football at every level the game is played.  It is the story of courage to do something great when the world (or at least America’s favorite sport) is against you.

Here is one of my favorite scenes from the movie:

I came out of the movie thinking, why don’t I have the courage, like Dr. Omalu, to do something great? In my professional world, I am a lawyer working for the largest publicly-owned oil company in the world. I consider myself an expert lawyer when it comes to doing deals, but all I have ever done in my career is make a lot of money for the company. No one will look at my professional contributions and say, there goes a courageous man who did something great and noble for his fellow human beings.

But perhaps I am being too hard on myself (as we all have a tendency to do).

One of my all-time favorite movies is Back to the Future**. As you will recall, Marty McFly is the teenaged son of George McFly, who, at the beginning of the film is portrayed as a nerdy loser, pretty much afraid of everyone and everything. George is antagonized in particular by Biff Tannen, who, when in high school with George, is the typical bully, who ultimately becomes George McFly’s supervisor, and who continues to bully George every chance he gets. Here is a link to a YouTube clip from the movie:

Marty McFly goes back in time to when his mother and father are in high school.  Lorraine Baines (later to become Marty’s mother) starts to fall in love with Marty, instead of his father, George, when Marty is accidentally hit by a car. Marty knows, if he doesn’t get Lorraine and George together, he will never be born. In a pivotal scene, Biff starts to force himself on Lorraine, and George somehow gets the courage to face Biff – something he has never been able to do before. He punches Biff, resulting in Lorraine instantly falling in love with George. Watch it here:

But the key is what develops afterword. Marty is finally able to get back to the future (which is really the present), but because of what George was able to do in the past due to Marty’s visit, this George McFly is totally different from the George McFly we saw at the beginning of the movie. He is hip, he is successful, and now Biff works for him. The morale of the story: In the face of a crisis, George McFly was able to stand up to his rival, overcome his fear and do the right thing – and that made all the difference.

Most of us will not have the chance to potentially change the world as Dr. Bennet Omalu and others may have done, but each of us can be like George McFly, willing to do something personally great when faced with our biggest challenges – which might just be having the courage to stand up to the local bully. Doing the “right” thing during a time of crisis, rather than blaming others or sitting around feeling sorry for ourselves, may not seem like a big deal at the time, but the ripple effect of such action may, over time, just change the world – if only our own.

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*Concussion

Directed by: Peter Landesman

Starring: Will Smith, Alec Baldwin

Written by: Peter Landesman and Jeanne Marie Laskas

Distributed by: Village Roadshow Pictures and Columbia Pictures

**Back to the Future

Directed by: Robert Zemeckis

Written by: Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale

Starring: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover

Distributed by: Universal

My favorite movie in high school was Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid*. I mean, what was not to like?  Butch and the Kid were handsome, funny and just plain cool.  More importantly, as a teenage boy, I had a huge crush on Katharine Ross, who played Etta Place, Sundance’s girlfriend.  She caught my eye when she costarred in Shenandoah when I was only 12.  Those feelings grew into a crush when I saw her in The Graduate at age 14, and love bloomed after I saw her in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid at age 16.  Here is a clip of one of my favorite scenes from the movie to the music of Burt Bacharach,  sung by J.B. Thomas:

After watching this scene, it’s easy to see why I fell in love with the beautiful Katharine Ross. But I digress.

Since I loved Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid so much, my friend and I decided to perform the following scene from the movie in our drama class. I played Butch.

After our performance (we got an A, by the way), I asked my drama teacher, “Didn’t you love that movie? She replied that she had never seen it.  I was shocked.  One of the best movies of all time and my drama teacher had never seen it!  She explained in words that shocked me even more.  “I don’t support immoral movies.”

Immoral? Huh?  She then explained.  “I consider it immoral because it makes the viewer root for men who were robbers and murderers.  Do we really want people like them to be our heroes?”

I had never thought of it in that light before. I did root for Butch and the Kid as they spent their days robbing banks and trains, and even though, in reality, their Wild Bunch Gang was credited with more than a half dozen murders.  And I admit I felt sad when the law finally caught up with them in Bolivia and presumably killed them.

How do we usually decide whether a movie is immoral? We look at movie ratings.  If it’s R rated, we often decide its probably something we shouldn’t see, but a PG-13 rating makes a movie OK, regardless of its content, theme or message.  A great movie might be rated R simply because the “F” word is used a few times, while a PG-13 movie might contain nothing but trash (but no “F” words).   Should we really let faceless people whom we know nothing about set our moral standards for us

Don’t get me wrong. Movie ratings can be helpful when deciding what movies to see.  But our analysis should go deeper than that.  Whenever I finish watching a movie, I try to take at least a few minutes to analyze it.  What did I learn from it?  Do I care about the characters?  Why or why not?  What motivated them to do what they did? Could the characters have handled things differently and for the better? What would I do if I were in a similar situation?  I do this analysis as an adult with no kids left at home.  How much more important would it be to have these types of discussions with our children about the movies they see – hopefully, together with us.

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*Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Directed by: George Roy Hill

Written by: William Goldman

Starring Paul Newman, Robert Redford, and Katharine Ross

Distributed by: 20th Century Fox