Lately, I've Been Moved

A week or so back on one of our Encore movie channels we get at home, I ran across one of my favorite movies, Beautiful Girls. The Sweet Caroline scene is just awesome, and every time I see it, I want to get together and reminisce with people I've loved through the years. Just watching that movie about a piano player that goes back home for his family reunion turned on my nostalgia button. That movie sort of got me on a movie binge the next few nights.

The next one I caught was... the ending of another all-time favorite, Dead Poets Society. Most reading have likely seen the flick and either love it or are pretty darned blah on it, those have been the two reactions I've gotten. Robin Williams plays William Keating, an English teacher who transforms a bunch of stiff, private-schooled boys with his own passion and frees them to experience life in a different and more lustrous way. Keating, at least to me, is a Christ-figure in the story. When tragedy strikes the school via the suicide of a student, outside forces rail and demand an investigation as to who's at fault. As one student notes, "Schools go down because of things like this." In an effort to find a scapegoat, the administration pins the entire nightmare on the lone Mr. Keating, an innocent save for his part in kindling passion in his students to find a "truer life." The boys most impassioned betray him to school authorities when push comes to shove. Keating takes all the heat for them, and the school itself, never looking down on anyone. Then, in a final rousing scene, the least talkative boy but the one with the most bottled up within, makes the boldest of declarations. Early in the movie, to open up the boys' eyes, Keating had them all ascend his desk and bellow the line from Whitman's famous poem, "O Captain My Captain." In the end, after everything has gone down -- meaning that any student showing favoritism to the condemned Keating faces expulsion (from their world) -- the quiet Tom Anderson (played by a young Ethan Hawke), just as Keating is about to leave class from collecting his personals, shouts out, "Mr. Keating, it wasn't your fault," declaring Keating's innocence, and, "they made us sign." The hard-nosed principal, substituting for Keating for the rest of the term, shouts for Anderson to quiet down and forces him back into his seat. "I know, Tom, I know," forgives Keating. The principal demands Keating's dismissal, and he wears the look of satisfaction as Keating begins to wander out. In one of the most moving scenes I'll ever witness, and filmed perfectly, a dress shoe steps up on the desk seat, and then the camera takes us to Tom spinning atop the desk to face Keating and proclaim, "O Captain My Captain!" Already redeemed from his previous dole existence, Tom redeems himself from his betrayal. Chamber music crescendos as one-by-one three quarters of the class follow suit and aver the same, "O Captain My Captain." Uplifting, tear-jerking, exhilarating. And when Mr. Keating ends the awesome spectacle with a nod and, "Thank you, boys," and as we stare at Tom's figure still standing at attention on his desktop, everything they risked and likely given away seems worth it. Man, what a powerful scene.

The next night, I caught the last half or so of Million Dollar Baby. Notwithstanding the problem I have with how the major characters resolve their issues (i.e. Euthanasia), the father-daughter unconditional love relationship that builds throughout the movie between Frankie (Eastwood) and Maggie (Swank) is priceless. As a father, I want to love like Eastwood does (just not come to the same conclusion at the end). I loved the movie, or at least the first 4/5 of it. Other movies that have really moved me:

The Iron Giant: The giant's Superman-like sacrifice at the end for the town stirs my heart. Just one of the greatest cartoon movies ever. Probably my favorite of all of them. The twisted Kent Mansley is on of my favorite bad guy characters in any movie ever.

Big Fish: Ken mentioned this movie in this post, and I think he loves the larger-than-life aspect of Edward Bloom, a role Ewan McGregor nails, by the way. I really like that aspect, too, but the emotional father-son relationship is key for me. Will Bloom, the son (played by Billy Crudup), genuinely thinks his father has a secret life that he prefers over the one shared with his son and wife, and Will assumes he makes up these unbelievable stories to cover that life. However, when his father dies, Will is surprised to find that all those stories his father shared along the way were at least partially and often mostly true. The revelation happens at the funeral - the giant, the Circus Conductor werewolf, people from the town of Spectre, the Vietnamese twins, they all show up. The way Burton pulls this off is masterful and brings tears to the eyes. What was already a great movie is capped off in perfect fashion.

Lastly, I'll mention Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ. I'm neither here nor there about how much of this movie was technically correct or if the crucifixion happened exactly this way. In my opinion, Gibson did enough to have me thinking all movie long just how much the Almighty did for me coming to earth, first as a poor child born to poor parents, then living perfectly, followed by a three-year, Heaven-bent mission that showed and told us how to live, and finally to accomplish the means and ends of this mission to defeat sin, death, and separation from God by submitting Himself to die on a cross. All those feelings, while watching Gibson's depiction of my Savior being beaten, mocked, and nailed... well, from beginning to end, my cinematic experience of watching Passion moved me like nothing ever has and likely never will. I don't even know if it was a great movie, but it was good enough for me.

Sorry for the length of this. I wanted to open up the Comments to anyone else's thoughts on movies, TV shows, or even songs that move them. Don't figure on a lot of takers -- most people probably won't even get this far in the reading, and bless your hearts if you have -- because talking about something that truly moves you is sort of personal. But anyone who has anything to share, I'd love to hear it. Thanks for bearing the load.

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