Movies and the Misery

"What came first--the music or the misery? Did I listen to music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to music? Do all those records turn you into a melancholy person?"

Rob from Nick Hornby's High Fidelity.





Music never fucked me up the way movies did. A great song or a great album does nothing but make me happy. Even the saddest music in the world gives me comfort, because I realize that any pain I'm feeling at that time has been felt by plenty of other people as well. Or it just provides a great soundtrack to a bad mood.

Movies are more sinister, though. They promise something and never deliver. You spend two hours with a movie, getting lost in its world, for that brief time believing everything on the screen could happen, whether it's Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star or that a pair of star-crossed lovers might actually wind up together.

Music floats in and out of our heads, sometimes staying little more than a few weeks (like much of today's one-hit wonders) or moves in, sets up shop, and never leaves, becoming part of who we are (Revolver, Tigermilk, and Astral Weeks are just a few that own nice two-story brownstones in my brain.) Music may shape who we are, but it's a pretty benign process, merely a part of the "Stuff we like" that says little more than what our tastes are. Only the few really get fucked up from music. Think about Brian Wilson driving on a stretch of California highway, pulling over to listen to "Be My Baby" for the first time, having his mind blown by Phil Spector's Wall of Sound.

Movies, though. Movies. How many of us have walked out of a movie wishing that our lives could be like the exciting, larger-than-life worlds presented on the silver screen? When I was a child, it was of course the Star Wars trilogy that promised escape. Who wanted to live in a small Illinois town when you could be off in that galaxy far, far away, battling Stormtroopers and fighting with lightsabers? I remember being 11, on vacation in 1983, walking through a forest with my uncle, and all I could say was, "this would be a great place for a speeder bike chase."

Of course, such silly childish fantasies are replaced by something much more substantial and important: girls. Childish obsession about Star Wars is replaced by adolescent day-dreaming about pretty girls who sit next to you in Chemistry. And movies once again fuel that fire.

Let's face it: movies and our love lives should never get involved, because it's a dirty marriage of hope, dreams, and cold reality. How many of us have watched a love story unfold onscreen and think, "This is just like my life!" How many people wanted their own relationships to be just like Love Story, or Annie Hall, or Say Anything? And then the cute dialogue and happy endings of said films become the brass ring we chase after in our own love lives.

For a time, When Harry Met Sally... was that movie for me. Madly in love with a female high school friend, that damn movie whispered in my ear, "See, best friends can fall in love and live happily ever after!" And so foolishly spurred on by the false hope film promised, I got my heart broken, not for the first time.

As I became a bit older, I looked to movies not for hope, but for warning. Mature, darker movies like The Age of Innocence and The Remains of the Day showed me the dangers of not following your heart, the consequences of not "Seizing the Day," as Dead Poets Society had instructed me to do senior year. As I grew older, I saw that you couldn't compare your own life to the made-up ones depicted on-screen. Movies are entertainment, made-up stories with happy endings that aren't a whole lot like life. Your life could not be like it was in film. You would never be Lloyd Dobler.

Then in 1995 I saw a film called Before Sunrise. A young American (Ethan Hawke) meets a Parisian (Julie Delpy) in Vienna, and they spend an evening walking, talking, and falling in love. The film ends with them promising to meet again in six months, but we never find out what happens to them. They go their separate ways, and we are left to create our own version of what happened later. When I was depressed and frustrated with love, I figured they never saw each other again, because that's life, right? If I was feeling hopeful, I thought they might have a chance. Director Richard Linklater sort of anwered the question in his head-trip of a film Waking Life, where we see Jesse and Celine talking in bed, apparently happy and living together. But it was just a dream, and we never really knew.

Dream or no dream, we're still talking movies here, so it's all fake anyway, right? What made Before Sunrise different for me was that it seemed so real, so genuine. Here was a movie that got it right. I watched it over and over, sharing it with others, and always wondering. The fate of Jesse and Celine said a lot to me about how my own life was going to turn out. As my 20s faded and my love life sputtered along, I held out hope that one day I would meet someone and we would connect like those two young people in Vienna.

When I heard that a sequel was being made to Before Sunrise, my first emotion was not excitement (like when I heard that George Lucas was finally making Star Wars: Episode One), but fear. Now we would know what really happened to Jesse and Celine, and all my little versions of What Happened would be replaced by the definitive answer. I probably wasn't really worried about that. I was more worried that they would mess it up, diminishing my opinion of the original (See Star Wars: Episode One.)

So when I was walking around Cambridge, Massachusetts a couple of weeks ago, I finally bought a ticket to see Before Sunset. As the film began, I saw two characters I had known so well, only now they were older, wiser, their youthful declarations of "Let's meet up right here in six months!" replaced by a more mature outlook on life.

I won't go into the details of the film, so don't worry about spoilers. But once again, I have been fucked up by a film. Before Sunset is 90 minutes of people in their early 30s haunted by a night they spent together nine years ago. I had never really "identified" with Jesse and Celine in Before Sunrise, aside from the fact that they were my age and liked good conversation. But as I sat and watched the scene in the car, where Jesse and Celine finally unload all the baggage they've carried around with them for nine years, I started thinking about my own baggage, and what I've carried with me. I saw how that night really fucked them up, and I saw much more of myself in those two characters than I ever had before. I saw what being over 30 was really about, all the choices, compromises, and good and bad decisions you make after you start to "grow up."

During that long drive home from Boston, I thought a lot about where I've come in nine years. I saw a 32 year old who still lives like he's 23. In my small rented apartment I've shielded myself nicely from any sort of real commitment. Most of my friends have gotten married, bought houses, and are having kids. I still sit around on donated furniture watching Conan O'Brien and collecting Lord of the Rings figures, holding out for the one moment that will transform my life and make everything perfect.

Am I saying that I'm suddenly going to go out and buy a house and get married? No, of course not. But it's time to start getting serious. I'll be 33 in December, my "coming of age" in Hobbit years. (Yes, the Lord of the Rings reference implies immaturity, but give me that one.) I can't spend my entire life waiting for it to become a plot from a film.

Not that I've spent the last ten years working at a video store and living in my parents' basement. I have a very successful career, run a great theatre company, and consider myself a fairly cultured and mature guy. But there are many parts of my life I've put on hold, and many parts of my youth I've been unable to give up on. But I'm older now, and I have to start acting my age.

I'm certainly not going to give up listening to the music I like, or start buying sensible Dockers from JC Penny. I still have standards! And while I've spent a lot of time talking about how movies are fake, and evil, and deliver false promises, ironically it's Before Sunset that has woken me up a bit. And I don't even think I've figured it all out yet.