So, I finally got to go see "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button". Karissa has been insisting that I go see it by myself at the first available opportunity ... so yesterday, I caught a matinee downtown... the 12:35 Tuesday afternoon empty-theater special. First of all, I paid $5.00 for my ticket! $5.00, people!!! It was like an out-of-body experience. I was so excited, I didn't even mind paying $6.75 for a Honda Civic-sized tub of luscious, artery-packing, butter-it-yourself popcorn.
(alas, Jon... no Fat Tire 40's this time around... my pockets were only big enough to smuggle a couple of those tiny bottles of SoCo and Baileys. Five words: Courtesy Cup With Ice, Please)
I hadn't been to see a movie by myself since taking in "No Country for Old Men" in Times Square last February. So this was like a MAJOR treat for me. I'm not going to go into great detail or write a pretentious-sounding review of the movie (sorry... the film) or anything, other than to say I really really enjoyed it. As I suspected, it barely resembled the original short story by Fitzgerald, and for that, I was thankful. (see earlier post) The film version of the story corrected what I considered the primary error of the original story, by allowing Benjamin to age emotionally while his body became younger physically (instead of causing him to age backward both physically and emotionally). This just simply made a lot more sense to me, and it made for a much more captivating story.
Have I already mentioned that the experience of fatherhood -although a relatively recent phenomenon for me- has completely laid to waste any vestige of emotional stagnation that has accumulated within me from years of suppressed ministry trauma? Well, it HAS. I have recently been moved to tears by several TV commercials involving babies, magazine articles involving babies, and one particular scene in The Incredibles. Although the movie is most definitely a tragedy of sorts, it's not nearly as tragic as you might have thought if you had been sitting next to me. I was, in no uncertain terms, a wreck. I think I melted down into full-fledged, shoulder-heaving sobbing fits 5 or 6 different times. Yes, I threw (and by this admission, continue to throw) all pretense of machismo into the gusty Colorado breeze and just enjoyed the heck out of an incredibly gorgeous movie.
Not everybody done liked it. Roger Ebert himself claimed that "there is no lesson to be learned," and that "no catharsis is possible," because the film simply doesn't depict the truth of the human experience. I think, perhaps when viewed in a global sense, Ebert has a point. But there are countless moments throughout the almost 3-hour movie that are simply saturated with truth, beauty, and honesty. And absorbing Benjamin Button moment by moment was just as powerful and lovely as I hoped it would be.
Also, it's become so commonplace to see TV and film actors aged to various extents/extremes with make-up and digital manipulation... But what really impressed me was the sight of Brad Pitt looking 20 years old by the end of the movie. Not sure how they pulled that one off... clothespins, maybe? And I have to say that there's no shame in recognizing that a good-looking fella is a good-looking fella... and Mr. Jolie is one seriously good-looking fella. I just had to say it.
Coming soon ... the dreaded-yet-inevitable blog about why I'm blogging.
Should be a real scroll-bar scroller.
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