mystic river

one look over my dvd collection will evidence that i don't have to have a happy ending: the rules of the game, ace in the hole, bicycle thieves, just to name a few (and it's late at night; that's all i could think of at the moment.) while i do relish delightfully in the fairy tale endings of amelie, slumdog millionaire, or my perennial favorite, sleepless in seattle, i think i do subscribe, in part, to reiner warner fassbinder's philosophy that, if the problem is solved by the end of the movie, then we will walk away unchanged. but if a story leaves us thinking, then we have a chance to learn from that and make ourselves into a better person.
i just finished mystic river. i didn't like it.

my main interest in seeing it was knowing what performance beat bill murray for lost in translation in 2003. bill deserved to win, and now i know. but that's beside the point.
mystic river is an expertly told story of tragedy and human suffering; people learning to cope with an deal with sorrows of mortal life. however, the events that most people struggle with are too banal, and so the tension must be heightened. in most movies, this involves murder; it does in mystic river. as a craft, the film is excellent. the choice of constant blue colors throughout the movie was great, the cast was superb all around (and there are half a dozen a-list actors in the cast), the story kept me interested to the end and knew how to take its time without being boring. but, in the end, what was it? another story about the drama of tragedy. one of the best, but still that. i would list it alongside movies such as there will be blood and american beauty; stories that, in terms of technique, are nigh-impeccible, but that leave me feeling empty; no desire to say "wow" and think about what i saw. all three of the movies i just listed could be (and have been) taken apart and examined for their themes, morals, and messages, and there are good lessons you can take from all of them. but none leave me with an eagerness to learn from them. if you want to teach me, you have to give me a reason to want to learn from you.

there is suffering in life. people struggle to deal with the trials and hardships and confusion that we have experienced, that we have caused, or that we see around us. i don't think we should ignore it and paint over it with an expectation our prince who will one day come. we can look around and declare that life is rotten and hate it. or we can say that life is rotten but we wish it was better, although sometimes people throw up their hands in the tragedy that, while they wish it was different, it's not. that seemed to be what mystic river said.
of all the movies that i have seen and loved, the movie i want to have made myself is amelie. to say, yes, life is hard and hurts at times, but it's so good. that happiness and goodness come and spread by working toward them. not by closing our eyes and wishing all the bad and hurt would go away, but by looking at the good even when there's bad all around.
eastwood's movie the following year, million dollar baby, did much better. instead of showing horrible events and saying "look at this! what do you think?", it simply and quietly told a story and let us watch and think. it's subtle, but the result is huge. are they really that different in their presentation? perhaps not, but i think so. and that's part of what makes art an art.