With fall at our doorsteps, winter knocks, and it demands an answer. The answer to the question that poses in between is somewhere near the question mark. It makes us awe-stricken. Like the dew on a foreboding winter morning, it sticks and shines until the morning shifts into the afternoon. So with this coming winter, I started this blog post. In my thought, only one film comes that would answer the questions of this fall.
The demand of answering the socio-political issues with the uncertainty of society -Yes, only one movie can fulfill this demand. And that is Forrest Gump. In this month's Cinema Agenda, we are going to confirm it.
With a judging hammer in our hand, we will break down the walls of this particular movie. We hope the audience will enjoy the show, as it also demands a relative set of expectations.
Forrest Gump is a myth of 20th century America. Robert Zemeckis's film comprehensively tracks the story of America from the post-world War two period into the post-watergate era. And like any other good myth, it filters historical facts through innovative characters and a particular language. The director of this movie had to use a simple tone to dictate a symbolic journey that makes sense out of a complicated and confusing era of America. Forrest's life's story is interwoven with the major historical events from the 1950s to the 1980s of America. Zemeckis even inserts Forrest into original archival footage in a technique considered pretty cutting-edge. After the movie's release in 1994, the film rewrites history so that the character is there, the secret catalyst of all the events that define our collective memory. The most important personal events in his life map onto pivotal historical moments or form a recognizable history as a backdrop. The film also uses the most iconic music associated with the periods it covers. The story of this film is America's story; it begins with the shameful past. Forrest is named after Nathan Bedford Forrest, the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. So the story starts in the shadow of America's original sin, and it moves forward at its pace.
The Main Character's Development along with the Plot -
His childhood in the 50s is pretty peaceful and happy. It is just like the decade was a prosperous one for many Americans. Forrest's confusion as he runs straight off the college football field reflects the 60s. Tumultuously in Vietnam, he watches his friends get killed and wounded in a war that doesn't make sense to him. Personally feeling the defining American tragedy of this era - the cultural division between establishment types and counterculture hippies, again affects Forrest deeply. Also, how he and his love Jenny got separated for their different paths. Forrest helps open up US relations with Communist China. In his post-military life, he becomes an exemplary entrepreneur. Transforming a dinky boat into a successful shrimping business overnight, he lives like the American ideal of getting obscenely beneficial through simple perseverance. In 1976, Forrest started a three-year cross-country run after Jenny left him. And his heartbreak is linked to a national need to heal and process the tumult of the 60s. For some reason, it makes sense to Jenny's death in the early 80s. It is part of the dawning AIDS crisis. And it symbolizes mourning for something beautiful and pure of our national character that was lost in these times. But while he will never be over his grief for Jenny, his touching life as a father and the vast potential of his son Forrest jr. leave us with optimism that the kids and the future of America will be alright.
So what exactly is the movie trying to say by choosing this unassuming passive simpleton to carry the mantle of our country's history?
-At first glance, Forrest lacks stereotypical American traits like ambition, ego, self-interest, or career goals. The very first thing we are told about him is that he is slow-witted. Forrest, even his last name 'Gump is a word for a fool. Yet, he achieves all the trappings of the classic American dream - serving his country, becoming a successful capitalist, meeting presidents, and starting a family with a woman he has always loved. And while it may seem, he rises purely thanks to dumb luck, though he possesses qualities that account for his success, reflect something about America's national character.
One of his greatest gifts is his single-minded focus and straightforward dedication to the task at hand. When someone gives Forrest a simple direction like to run across a field, keep his eye on a ping-pong ball, or reassemble a gun, he excels at this. It is like there is no extra clutter in his brain distracting him and getting in the way of his focus. Because he is so unintellectual, he never gets bored with tasks others would find repetitive. And this aspect of Forrest's nature may be getting at how the US does well when it channels its energy into achieving clear objectives.
Another of Forrest's defining skills is his ability as a runner, which symbolizes stamina and resilience. His love of running captures an American enthusiasm and all-or-nothing attitude.
"If you're going to do something, why walk when you could run" and it also represents the fortitude to keep going no matter how tough it gets - "my mom always said you got to put the past behind you before you can move on and I think that's what my running was all about."
In the scene where a group of local teenage boys chases Forrest, their car features a prominent Confederate flag license plate as if Forrest is trying to outrun the evils and pain of our country. Yet, Forrest always does outrun whatever is dangerous after him. Even as the forces chasing him get more and more formidable. Though Forrest has many disadvantages in his life(he has a low IQ, a crooked spine, and an absent father), he miraculously overcomes his disability. This movie reveals that the only superpower a human possesses is optimism at their heart. The implied message is that our 20th-century journey is about triumphing over darkness even when it seems impossible. Jenny first tells to run away from problems, but Forrest's impulsive run is ultimately a zeal for running itself, embodying the wisdom that the journey is the real destination. When Bubba later repeats Jenny's instructions during battle, Forrest characteristically does what he is told. But he quickly sees a problem with running away as Bubba struggles with life and death situations. So he runs back into the line of fire.
("Bubba was my best good friend I had to make sure he was okay")
-what's beautiful about the scene of him rescuing his wounded brother is the simplicity of his motivation in contrast to the grandiosity of lieutenant Dan's dream of dying heroically. His instinctual understanding that we don't leave our friends behind is what heroism really is. This scene also shows that when the important things are on the line, you have to act rather than be judgmental about the situation. Forrest is not just mindlessly obedient; he is a lot smarter in critical circumstances. He only concerns himself with the few things that truly matter to him. Forrest also has a total lack of ego and a down-to-earth love of his home.
While Forrest is not a creative guy himself, he is responsible for Elvis's moves. "Sh*t happens!", the t-shirt idea, following runners - all these revelations come out of his ability to be himself in an unfiltered unselfconscious way. And this realness sparks, and breakthroughs. He embodies through egalitarianism that you are the same as everybody else. He possesses the virtue of being receptive and inexhaustible ability to love.
Other Character's Development along with Forrest -
If Forrest is the central spirit of America, the supporting characters represent other key mythical or spiritual aspects of America's national identity.
- Forrest's first inspiration is his mother, who represents fierce love of family and the power of the wisdom of homegrown folk. - "life is a box of chocolates Forrest, you never know what you're gonna get." Mrs. Gump's words are essentially a Bible to her son. It translates the complicated world into accessible language and evocative metaphors. Almost all his beliefs come from her mother. He always refers to 'Mama always says/said' to explain his wisdom to others. When he needs guidance, he looks for ways to interpret his mother's teachings just as one might interpret a Bible verse. Mrs. Gump instills in Forrest the liberating knowledge, that despite differences in our gifts and our fortunes, everyone is equal. More often, in American culture, they emphasize telling kids they are special one-of-a-kind. But the characters in this story who feel they are special, smart, important, or entitled to a privileged life suffer due to that thinking. Like Lieutenant Dan Taylor, you still a lieutenant thing for stable, well-adjusted temperament comes out of the philosophical tools. His mother gave him to process this world, especially what is dark and troubling about it. "Father went on a vacation." and presents the idea that he is never coming back. She does not lie to Forrest about how smart he is; instead, she drills into him to the point that he has control over whether he does - stupid things or not. And that is what really counts. Instead of denying her son's disadvantages or shielding him from the discouraging aspects of life or history, his mother told Forrest that sometimes we all do things that do not make any sense. She equips him with a matter-of-fact worldview that does not allow adversity or hardships to make him feel disempowered. Later we see pretty much every other character was unable to deal with the kind of adversity that Forrest overcomes. And his resilience is largely thanks to his mother's education which taught him to look truths in the face.
- Forrest's childhood sweetheart Jenny represents historical trauma. Her father's abuse leads her to repeat a pattern of self-harming choices and toxic relationships with men for a long time. She rejects Forrest's love seemingly because she thinks she should be with a man who will hurt her. Her childhood trauma caught up here with her choice of a partner. Forrest and Jenny are inversions of each other. While Forrest is slow, Jenny is smart and perceptive. Forrest grows up content in the warmth of his mother's unconditional love, while the first thing Jenny knows of this world is her father's abuse. Forrest runs everywhere toward the world; Jenny shares that open go where life leads you attitude. But for her, it is really running away. Her recurring desire is to become a bird, but she can never escape the pain as she's trying to be free from that guy flashes fresh because it is deep inside her, eating her from the within. I do not know about the novel, written by Winston Groom, but in the film adaptation screenwriter, Eric Roth transferred all of Forrest's flaws and most of the excesses Americans committed in the 60s and 70s to her. So we can see how the film explicitly turns Jenny into a symbol of America's inability to heal from past wounds. She represents the 60s counterculture that strove to break with past injustice and create a future based on love and equality. She discovered ways to expand her and learn how to live in harmony. But Jenny is too wounded to really do this, so her dreams of peace give way to attempts to escape reality just as the free love movement eventually deteriorated similarly. Despite her tragic fate, Jenny represents an incredible beauty in the American spirit-history, the idealism of the 60s was a remarkable dream. Likewise, in Forrest's eyes, nothing and no one compares to Jenny. She was like an angel - "I've never named a boat before, but there was only one I could think of the most beautiful name." Forrest's life is always tinged with sadness because however much he prospers, the one he loves is not with him for most of it. So, though Forrest himself embodies the optimism and resilience of America's national character, his love for Jenny captures that the losses and suffering of the less fortunate among them.
- Michigan Bubba represents the American entrepreneurial spirit. His dream is to start his own business and rise on the capitalist ladder. Significantly, the one main character of color in the film has the most capitalists drive. For this young black man, the capitalist-American dream represents the chance to make a better life than his ancestors had. And after Bubba dies and Forrest makes his dream a reality, we see the power of money in freeing Bubba's mother from that oppressive history. Yet, Bubba himself never gets to make this happen, so he also becomes a symbol of the great human potential that America has lost to senseless Wars.
- Rather than that lieutenant, Dan represents the American military tradition. "somebody in his family had fought and died in every war." His wish to continue in his ancestor's footsteps captures the military's illustrious past and how it is a way of life for generations of American families. But his crisis in Vietnam interrupts that tradition and shatters his worldview. This incident gets at how Vietnam made people question previous assumptions that America was the good guy. Instead of finding glory, Lieutenant Dan is permanently scarred and returns to a world that does not respect his sacrifice. Yet, in the end, this man comes to be grateful that he survived. "I never thanked you for saving my life." and the suggestion is that by making it through this test, he comes out the other side with a richer understanding of what life is all about.
- Jenny and Forrest's son, little Forrest, signals the promise of the next generation. He embodies the best of both his parents his mother's intelligence. The movie tells us that this young boy does not represent a departure from history. He has his father's first name and will grow up in the same house. So little Forrest represents the power of building and improving upon their country's past to live up to their full potential.
With Development the Plot Finalize -
This film gives many messages with its simple tone. Primarily, it gives us hope to look forward. And secondarily not to neglect the mistakes of the past. It celebrates capitalism and lets us buy into the dream of becoming rich. It emphasizes the importance of being a good person who loves your hometown and your mother. And it hints at a divine presence watching over us.
The filmmakers intended the story to be political, but Forrest Gump is not about politics or conservative values. It is about humanity. Even when Forrest speaks his thoughts on the Vietnam War, the mic gets unplugged, so we don't get to hear them. Within the story, his fellow citizens can not understand how he can have no political ideology. Everywhere he goes, they try to project motivations onto him. Forrest grounds his story and events that dominate America's collective national memory and that is inextricably bound up with personal memories. So the goal of this exercise is to bring us together with shared stories and to illustrate the link between personal and communal well-being. "mom always said there's an awful lot you could tell about a person by their shoes, where they go, where they've been." His gift for storytelling echoes USA's ability to craft a narrative about itself that people want to buy into. If there is one image that this modern American myth has made eternal, it is young Forrest breaking free of his restraints and doing what nobody thought he could do. He never let the bullies in the darkness of the world overtake him, and this too is Forrest Gump's fundamental belief about the American spirit.
You can simply do something impossible, so believe in yourself and pursue what you are good at. While writing about this film, I missed many important points, along with the symbolism and doctrines. But I think my readers will surely forgive as they can get something from this post. Though there are plot holes, there is also honey-dipped information in this blog. So if you are quite obliged to do with my writings, please leave a comment below about how you felt about this film. And obviously, if you think you have detected a point that I missed in this blog, please write it down in the comment section. I will check it later. So then, until December we will meet up again. Thank you!
Ah! The American Dream!
ReplyDeleteyes, The American Dream indeed!
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