When I was a kid, I loved movies. Well, that sentence is somewhat misleading: its not like I didn't love anything but movies, or that I no longer love movies today. But since I'm going to talk about movies and my childhood and, specifically, how they are related, I thought I'd start of with a topical introduction in the form of a statement of facts relevant to the subject. There was no need to mention anything else and so I didn't - so get off my back, ok? Anyway…
When I was a kid, I loved movies. I have very strong childhood memories attached to various films of the 80s and 90s. The great thing about watching movies as a kid is that you are largely oblivious to how awful most of them are. For example, at various points in my youth, I actually believed that "Masters of the Universe," "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," and "Independence Day" were good movies. Children have no idea what good acting is like, or how to recognize a plot that's made of pointless drivel thinly disguised by high budget special effects. Ok, so most adults have no idea about those things either, but that's beside the point. Kids see everything with a child-like wonder and imagination that allows them to be sucked into the world of the movie and really experience the story. They never say, "Yeah, right, like we're supposed to believe the car wouldn't have blown up by now." They just say, "Whoa.... Awesome!!!" The only mistake a movie can make is to be boring; other than that, its all believable. Nobody can suspend their disbelief like children.
I believed the movies. The earliest movies in my life were probably "Star Wars" and "Superman II" which I watched over and over on VHS until I thought that, if I just tried hard enough, I could switch off the light switch with the Force or fly like a bird and/or plane. I watched "Mary Poppins" and really believed that imagination could take me to a cartoon wonderland. Other movies had lessons for me as well. "Beauty and the Beast" taught me never to judge a book by its cover because good-looking people are often evil. "The Princess Bride" showed me that love conquers all and revenge is OK as long as its on a bad guy. And "Jurassic Park" taught me not to trust dirty capitalists using genetic cloning to create a theme park of dinosaurs for their own financial gain (and boy has that lesson come in handy a few times).
The problem is, so many of the messages you get from these movies turn out to be total crap in the real world. I mean, I was just talking about movies before, but if you look at all the morals kids are picking up about life through other media like TV programs, storybooks and fairy tales, etc. etc., you'll see that they are dramatically unpreprared to face reality. Most of those things teach kids that people live happily ever after, or that if you are nice to others they will be nice to you, or that you can grow up to be whatever you want. I'm not sure why we continually present children with a sort of idealized version of life. I have a few ideas, but I'm probably wrong so I won't share them. Regardless, we do lie to children, if somewhat subtly, and I should know. I'm an idealist, and that started a long long time ago when the movies first starting preaching to me their simple, seductive brand of idealism. You can imagine how difficult it has been for me to discover that no, not everybody lives happily ever after, that bad guys don't always get what they deserve, the hero doesn't always get the girl, and, confusingly, good and evil are often very hard to tell apart. There aren't any black hats/white hats in real life. But I can handle those disappointments, I guess. Just a little bit of maturity and you can begin to see through those ideas.
For you literary theory fans, what we're talking about here in many ways is simulacra, that symbol which does not represent anything, that copy for which there is no original. It is a representation of a "reality" that does not in fact exist. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, your homework is to read Jean Baudrillard's essay "Simulacra and Simulations," or indeed pretty much any treatise on post-modern critical theory. And yes, there will be a quiz. So anyway, its all been one big disappointment. It feels a bit like the friends of my childhood have betrayed me, have been lying all this time, but by and large I'm coping with it all.
Except for one movie, whose betrayal struck me deepest of all. One movie, whose message sounds so wonderful, so encouraging, so close to how the world, if it made any sense, should be that it took me a long, long time to realize it was a big fat lie. It's a movie that I now regard with a mixture of affection and some bitterness, like an ex-girlfriend. I'm talking, of course, about "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," the great 1971 musical with Gene Wilder. Yes, I have seen the recent version with Johnny Depp, and no, I'm not going to talk about it. Because its irrelevant, thats why! Refer to my first paragraph...
Anyway, the message of that movie seems to be, "if you want something badly enough, you'll get it." Well, isn't it? Charlie hasn't a hope in the world of getting a golden ticket - he only gets one chocolate bar a year, doesn't he? But Grandpa Joe insists he has more chance than anybody else because he wants it more. And then Charlie, by some miracle, gets one and ends up getting the whole factory and everything he's ever wanted for himself and his family. The movie ends with Willy Wonka saying, "Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he ever wanted.... he lived happily ever after." And I ate this up! I BELIEVED this! If I truly wanted something enough, I would get it. If I didn't, I probably didn't want it badly enough. I should have had my first hint something was wrong when I was seven and wanted to be a Mouseketeer on the Mickey Mouse Show so badly my whole body ached, or when I wanted a Nintendo, or to play a big part in the 10-minute play we did in 4th grade. I got NONE of those things. But still I believed that Charlie and Willy Wonka and Grandpa Joe couldn't be lying.
Well guess what, kids. I hate to break it to you, but take it from somebody who knows firsthand. Sometimes, no matter how badly you want something, you won't get it. That's life. It doesn't matter if its a part in a play, a successful career in acting, world peace, a capable President, an excellent singing voice, good looks, wealth, the item you purchased on E-bay that still hasn't arrived, popularity, a blog successful as Chris Clark's, the ability to live up to your parents' expectations, having a normal life, or even just having somebody who could never possibly love you love you - it just doesn't work. Is it any wonder then that half the time I hear the song "I've Got a Golden Ticket" I grow bitter and cynical and want to say, "Well, how nice for YOU, Charlie Stupid-head!" or something mature like that?
The other half of the time? That's when I sing along at the top of my voice, weeping with childish joy and thinking hopefully of my future years; because for that brief moment, if I can dream it and want it then it will be mine - and everything will be happy ever after after all.
When I was a kid, I loved movies. I have very strong childhood memories attached to various films of the 80s and 90s. The great thing about watching movies as a kid is that you are largely oblivious to how awful most of them are. For example, at various points in my youth, I actually believed that "Masters of the Universe," "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," and "Independence Day" were good movies. Children have no idea what good acting is like, or how to recognize a plot that's made of pointless drivel thinly disguised by high budget special effects. Ok, so most adults have no idea about those things either, but that's beside the point. Kids see everything with a child-like wonder and imagination that allows them to be sucked into the world of the movie and really experience the story. They never say, "Yeah, right, like we're supposed to believe the car wouldn't have blown up by now." They just say, "Whoa.... Awesome!!!" The only mistake a movie can make is to be boring; other than that, its all believable. Nobody can suspend their disbelief like children.
I believed the movies. The earliest movies in my life were probably "Star Wars" and "Superman II" which I watched over and over on VHS until I thought that, if I just tried hard enough, I could switch off the light switch with the Force or fly like a bird and/or plane. I watched "Mary Poppins" and really believed that imagination could take me to a cartoon wonderland. Other movies had lessons for me as well. "Beauty and the Beast" taught me never to judge a book by its cover because good-looking people are often evil. "The Princess Bride" showed me that love conquers all and revenge is OK as long as its on a bad guy. And "Jurassic Park" taught me not to trust dirty capitalists using genetic cloning to create a theme park of dinosaurs for their own financial gain (and boy has that lesson come in handy a few times).
The problem is, so many of the messages you get from these movies turn out to be total crap in the real world. I mean, I was just talking about movies before, but if you look at all the morals kids are picking up about life through other media like TV programs, storybooks and fairy tales, etc. etc., you'll see that they are dramatically unpreprared to face reality. Most of those things teach kids that people live happily ever after, or that if you are nice to others they will be nice to you, or that you can grow up to be whatever you want. I'm not sure why we continually present children with a sort of idealized version of life. I have a few ideas, but I'm probably wrong so I won't share them. Regardless, we do lie to children, if somewhat subtly, and I should know. I'm an idealist, and that started a long long time ago when the movies first starting preaching to me their simple, seductive brand of idealism. You can imagine how difficult it has been for me to discover that no, not everybody lives happily ever after, that bad guys don't always get what they deserve, the hero doesn't always get the girl, and, confusingly, good and evil are often very hard to tell apart. There aren't any black hats/white hats in real life. But I can handle those disappointments, I guess. Just a little bit of maturity and you can begin to see through those ideas.
For you literary theory fans, what we're talking about here in many ways is simulacra, that symbol which does not represent anything, that copy for which there is no original. It is a representation of a "reality" that does not in fact exist. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, your homework is to read Jean Baudrillard's essay "Simulacra and Simulations," or indeed pretty much any treatise on post-modern critical theory. And yes, there will be a quiz. So anyway, its all been one big disappointment. It feels a bit like the friends of my childhood have betrayed me, have been lying all this time, but by and large I'm coping with it all.
Except for one movie, whose betrayal struck me deepest of all. One movie, whose message sounds so wonderful, so encouraging, so close to how the world, if it made any sense, should be that it took me a long, long time to realize it was a big fat lie. It's a movie that I now regard with a mixture of affection and some bitterness, like an ex-girlfriend. I'm talking, of course, about "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," the great 1971 musical with Gene Wilder. Yes, I have seen the recent version with Johnny Depp, and no, I'm not going to talk about it. Because its irrelevant, thats why! Refer to my first paragraph...
Anyway, the message of that movie seems to be, "if you want something badly enough, you'll get it." Well, isn't it? Charlie hasn't a hope in the world of getting a golden ticket - he only gets one chocolate bar a year, doesn't he? But Grandpa Joe insists he has more chance than anybody else because he wants it more. And then Charlie, by some miracle, gets one and ends up getting the whole factory and everything he's ever wanted for himself and his family. The movie ends with Willy Wonka saying, "Don't forget what happened to the man who suddenly got everything he ever wanted.... he lived happily ever after." And I ate this up! I BELIEVED this! If I truly wanted something enough, I would get it. If I didn't, I probably didn't want it badly enough. I should have had my first hint something was wrong when I was seven and wanted to be a Mouseketeer on the Mickey Mouse Show so badly my whole body ached, or when I wanted a Nintendo, or to play a big part in the 10-minute play we did in 4th grade. I got NONE of those things. But still I believed that Charlie and Willy Wonka and Grandpa Joe couldn't be lying.
Well guess what, kids. I hate to break it to you, but take it from somebody who knows firsthand. Sometimes, no matter how badly you want something, you won't get it. That's life. It doesn't matter if its a part in a play, a successful career in acting, world peace, a capable President, an excellent singing voice, good looks, wealth, the item you purchased on E-bay that still hasn't arrived, popularity, a blog successful as Chris Clark's, the ability to live up to your parents' expectations, having a normal life, or even just having somebody who could never possibly love you love you - it just doesn't work. Is it any wonder then that half the time I hear the song "I've Got a Golden Ticket" I grow bitter and cynical and want to say, "Well, how nice for YOU, Charlie Stupid-head!" or something mature like that?
The other half of the time? That's when I sing along at the top of my voice, weeping with childish joy and thinking hopefully of my future years; because for that brief moment, if I can dream it and want it then it will be mine - and everything will be happy ever after after all.
Comments
This is a great blog. I sort of saw it through my boys, who digest everything they see in the media.