A work of fiction…
Tonight, I had one of those experiences that probably everyone has had at one time or another, where you are sitting in your car wanting to go inside, but there is something on the radio that has your attention fully in its grip. This often happens when I listen to NPR–some interesting story that I just need to hear the conclusion to. This time, it was NPR, but it wasn’t some journalistic story or a interesting interview, this time it was an essay. The story was interesting, about a young man who shirked a normal life to care for his mentally challenged brother. As the author narrated his story, and I was quickly caught up into his tale of personal sacrifice and of smelly adventures with a pet armadillo.
The plot thickened when the brother met a good woman, one who was able to overlook, and even appreciate, the arrangement in a chaotic appartment. Eventually romance blossomed and a marriage separated the brothers, while surrogates were hired to look in on and clean up after the less able brother. This arrangement seemed to work, until the arrest of that brother. After the arrest, doctors suggested that the limited oversight was not adequate and that it was in everyone’s best interest to have him placed in a home.
I cannot convey to you adequately the emotional resonance the essay evoked as it dealt with such a difficult personal decision. I was not only gripped by the story, I was being emotionally moved. I could feel the pain and sense of betrayal that hung in the air as a man with a busy life explained to his rather-simple brother what the doctors suggested. I felt a brother’s sense of responsibility as he rationalized away the desire to take his brother in to his own home as he provoked anguish from his sibling. “I’d rather die, than to be cooped up in some home with a bunch of mumbling half-wits,” he would explain. The greatest pain, to be forced to separate from his beloved pet armadillo.
As all good stories do, this reached a fever pitch at the end of the second act, when a call in the middle of the night brought news of his the sudden death of a needy brother. Running naked through traffic with his armadillo, the brother is hit and partially impaled, bleeding to death before the ambulance could arrive.
Listening, I wiped streams of salty tears from my cheeks–my heart sank. Tears continued to fall as the brother told of having to identify the body at the hospital before racing off to the scene of his brother’s death. I anticipated what was next, as the brother searched the area franticly until he uncovered, beneath a sheet of discarded plywood, his brother’s badly injured armadillo. He raced to the only vet in town, in the middle of the night, in attempts to save the life of his dead brother’s best friend. He prodded the man from his bed with aggressive pounding at his door. He may have failed his brother, but he was certainly going to do everything he could in that moment to save armored rodent’s life, a living tangible link his brother.
I thought to myself, this is heart breaking, how could someone live with such a tragedy, under the condemnation of abandonment? As I subjectively processed the story, the announcer read the title and the author, and then said something that really affected me, “this was a work of fiction.” I almost felt cheated, how could I allow myself to feel so personally for a fictional story? How could I feel such empathy for an invented character. Man, I felt like a wuss.
All of this happened while I was returning home after watching the new Wes Anderson film, the Darjeeling Limited. Before I left the house, I read an LA Times review of the movie, which seemed to pretty much explain the reviewers disdain for Wes Anderson’s movies. But the reviewer said something that returned to me as I contemplated my emotional reaction to the story of a mentally retarded man and his pet armadillo. The reviewer pondered the possibility that Anderson simply used his films as a way to work out his own issues. I think he meant that as a dig, but in the midst of contemplating art, it seemed extremely relevant.
Maybe a good part of the storyteller’s art is working through personal demons. I certainly think that is my draw to filmmaking–an attempt to tell stories the express my personal issues. Maybe that isn’t the heart of movie making in general, a great deal is to simply entertain. Perhaps that is why I like Wes Anderson’s movies; while they certainly entertain, they also explore deep personal issues of relationships and personal longing.
Over the last year, I have focused my energies in the direction of becoming a filmmaker. As I approach my one year anniversary, I look back on the last year and see a tremendous amount of progress. I still don’t have a personal project to show for my time and energy, but I have learned that actually filming the project is only part of the process. I have worked on a number of sets this year, some were enjoyable and others miserable, but every single one helped me see something–that I need to be making movies that tell my stories. I have yet to work on a film that I thought was worth making from a personal perspective. While simply working on projects offers me some excellent experience and knowledge, I also have discovered that my personal desire as a filmmaker is to tell real stories.
The stories that I want to tell are about humanity and struggle, about adventure and sacrifice. Ultimately I want to tell stories about redemption or man’s need or longing for it. I don’t want to tell redneck comedies or urban crime dramas. I don’t want to do horror or gore flicks. I have absolutely no interest in a film that fails to explore issues or has no themes. Maybe that means that I will never be a filmmaker who has films seen by millions, but I think that I am OK with that. Movies are works of fiction, a storyteller’s device to explore something and take others on an visual emotional journey with it, sometimes that journey is fun and at other times, dark and dangerous.
Maybe the stories aren’t true, but they often allow you to connect and explore emotions and ideas that are not only true, but relevant to life. I don’t know if Wes Anderson’s films are his personal therapy sessions, I suspect they probably are on some level, but that can’t possibly be a bad thing. Perhaps by realizing the therapeutic aspects, it will help me to spend more time writing and less time talking about writing. Certainly, that would be a good thing.