I'm a romantic. Not like a Hallmark card, or rooftop candlelight dinners designed to sweep women off their feet (though i'm not opposed).... but more like the aesthetic sense : Imaginative but impractical. Hopeless optimist, hopeless romantic. Goes hand in hand. So reincarnation, of course, appeals to me greatly. Who wants to run off to some gold-drenched paradise to strum on a harp? When i finish my ride on this roller coaster of life, i'd love nothing more than to jump back in line and go for another ride.

I watched Birth this weekend, which is why this comes up. My expectations were pretty low, based on reviews. The premise was interesting though... a woman's husband dies and ten years later she's confronted by a boy that claims to be the husband, reincarnated. She laughs it off, but he offers plenty of proof and knows things that only the husband could know. The first half of the movie is mostly the romantic notions, and then love comes tumbling down.

The technical film critic in me really enjoyed the music (beautiful and used to great affect), the dark photography (best night scenes since Fincher's the Game), and the believability of the performances. How would you react in this scenario? What would it take to convince you that it was really the husband?

The part that kills me, is that it's life. We'd like to believe that love is the all-powerful force that holds the entire universe together. That love is many a splendid thing... That love lifts us up where we belong... That all you need is love... But the logical end of your brain can't help but butt-in and remind you how love is just a chemical reaction that evolution cursed us with to ensure that we keep procreating.

And then, in the end of Birth, there's a twist. Just when I was crushed into accepting logic, there's the glimmer of hope that maybe it was love all along. And we keep going on that glimmer alone.

1 Comments:

At 7/13/2005 9:43 AM,  Anonymous said...

now i must add this to my Q

 

Post a Comment