With no electricity or heat at home, we decided to spend our Saturday in White Plains, browsing books at the local Barnes & Noble, followed by a screening of the new Wachowski movie, Cloud Atlas, based on the novel by David Mitchell. Woo boy. My wife called it a "hot mess." She's right.
Like Terence Malick's Tree of Life, Cloud Atlas shifts back and forth in time and runs nearly three hours. The six story lines are enigmatic at best, but seem to converge around a parable about good and evil or, more precisely, bondage and freedom. I won't bore you with further cliches, I'm not a film critic. But go see it with an open mind.
What I did find especially illuminating was returning home around 8 pm to find our lights back on. More to the point, I went online, googled Lana Wachowski, and then watched a video of a recent speech she gave when accepting the Human Rights Campaign's Visibility Award.
Lana's story is inextricably linked to the movie's narrative and themes. In her acceptance speech, she quotes a line from the movie: "If I had remained invisible, the truth would stay hidden and I couldn't allow that." That's courage.
No comments:
Post a Comment