A little while ago I spend a particularly interesting day with Flagg. It was a fantastic day all around marred only by the absence of my girls. Sometime during the discussion we were having the movie American Beauty came up. I am not sure how or why, but that movie has an interesting place in my world.
American Beauty is one of the few things that can clearly remind me that I am sometimes pigeon holed.
Don’t get me wrong… I don’t mind much. This isn’t some angst written plea to be understood. I am who and what I am and one of the things that guides me in life is not to hide it (well, the legal parts anyway).ย As with so many other things it turned out one of my core principles was best articulated by someone close to me. In this case, it was Flagg.
No Apologies.
It was his slogan, but from the moment it was uttered it became a core test of my life. Could I live up to it? Could I live it myself. Did I dare? I am still not sure… but I am working on it.
Anyway I watch American Beauty fairly often in my media rotations. Since I am usually online in some form when I do and I am a pretty stream of consciousness guy I will mention it (in IM, Twitter, whatever). People will respond and say basically the same thing.ย Either “You are a perv!” or “Yeah, she’s hot”.
ย Now, all that is true. I am a “perv” and at least in that film Mena Suvari (right in the group photo) is damn hot. For that matter, Thora Birch (center) was pretty cute too. Add in some grainy voyeuristic footage and a cheerleader uniform and I certainly won’t complain. But that isn’t why I love this movie.
In the movie collection in my head American Beauty isn’t there next to Wild Things. American Beauty is shelved next to The Shawshank Redemption, if anything. The movies do not directly compare, but this gives you at least some idea what I mean.
AB is a movie about the joy that there is to be found in just being alive. From beginning to end there is a semi-dreamlike quality to the film. Nothing supernatural happens, yet somehow it all feels more. As a viewer our perception is shifted, ascribing increased importance to normal things. Looking for, and finding, more in each interaction and setting that we would have otherwise.
That is the brilliance of the film. This perspective shift is what the film does for us within itself, but it is also the lesson this film wants us to learn. That a shift in our attitude can allow us to see more than we might in what we would otherwise gloss over.
For only the second time in my life (the first was with Tatsumi) I sat down and simply watched that film with someone else. We talked about the cinematography, the sound design, the acting and the message. We talked about how it felt to see it. We sat in rapt silence for the last 10 minutes of the film because there is simply nothing else you can do.
- He tried to explain to me what that movie means to him.
- I tried to explain to him what that movie means to me.
- We succeeded, as much as we could.
- We failed as much as we inevitably would.
The subject of my pigeonholing came up and I realized that it was related. This is a movie about beauty but when most people want to talk about beauty they somehow shy away from the most obvious expression of it… actual human beauty. I don’t understand… and my enthusiasm for beautiful people (women, thanks to my orientation) reflects this. It has never felt shallow to me to realize my breath has left me at the sight of a long, tight pair of legs in a mini-skirt that flounces just right. It doesn’t feel shallow because it isn’t shallow.
Yes, sometimes I am not thinking deep thoughts. Sometimes all I am thinking is “goddam, I would make that girl cry my name till she couldn’t remember any other name for God but mine”. Other times though I am just thinking how amazing the universe is, and what a wonderful, insane miracle my very existence can be. Long legs in a short skirt. Is there anything so wondrous? Is there any better testament to the fact that I am alive? Think of all the things that must have happened to result in those legs, that skirt and the freedom to wear them where I can see.
Then again, I feel that way about skyscrapers too. So I doubt I can explain any of it and frankly it almost feels pointless to try. Skyscrapers and miniskirts? Are these really the things that sum up billions of years and the deaths of stars and galaxies? But they are.
Just watch the f*&*ling movie.
Enjoy.