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Saturday, February 7, 2009
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a film about a boy named Benjamin who was aging backwards. He was born old—probably at the age of eighty or so, and he grew younger everyday. Benjamin, as an old baby, was abandoned by his Father on the porch of a nursing home. A woman named Queenie who was working at that nursing home took in the baby and treated him as her own child despite his unusual physical attributes since she could not bear a child of her own. As the film progressed, Benjamin came across many people who taught him about the marvels of life—how to feel hatred, how to experience pain and happiness, and most especially, how to love and be loved. In return, he was also able to touch the lives of the people around him with his amusing personality—mature, yet seemingly innocent.
Clearly enough, this film distinctly illustrates how our lives are most often subordinates, or worse, victims of Time. The story is all about the uncontrollable and unalterable Time. It roughly shows how powerful Time can be. Its theme revolves around Time, and its relationship with Life—that Life is Time’s Fool. I originally got this idea from William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116. In this sonnet, there is this particular line that says “Love is not Time’s Fool”. In the film’s case, Time suddenly seemed to be the all mighty and powerful one. It became the giver of Life and Death. Over the course of the story, Time appeared to be mostly in control. Some of the circumstances of this idea about time are the deaths of some of the characters in the film. The death of one of the people in the nursing home who taught Benjamin how to play the piano. The death of the woman who always sang with her high-pitched voice. The death of Captain Mike. The death of Thomas Button. The death of Queenie. These deaths all came unexpectedly. No one would have ever predicted the exact time all these people would have died. It was only Time who knew when Death would take place. Another circumstance of Time’s supremacy throughout the film was Daisy’s accident. This one scene of the film is claimed by many of my friends to be their most favorite part. I, too, consider this as one of the most compelling events in the film. I believe that this part of the film depicts to us how the littlest of our actions can affect gravely the lives of others. I deem this similar to the idea of the Butterfly Effect. The Butterfly Effect refers to the notion that a butterfly's wings might create tiny changes in the atmosphere that may ultimately alter the path of a tornado or delay, accelerate or even prevent the occurrence of a tornado in a certain location. The flapping wing represents a small change in the initial condition of the system, which causes a chain of events leading to large-scale alterations of events. Had the butterfly not flapped its wings, the trajectory of the system might have been vastly different. While the butterfly does not cause the tornado, the flap of its wings is an essential part of the initial conditions resulting in a tornado. And so Benjamin said in the film that if only one of the series of events that led to Daisy’s accident had changed, chances were the accident never would have happened. If only there was a shift in the Time of the lives of the people involve, then a whole different outcome might have occurred. Again, this shows how Time catches each of us off-guard and surprises us in a lot of ways. Although the story implicitly showed how Time only keeps moving forward, and that nobody can ever change what Time has already allowed to happen, there are two symbolic figures that makes me think otherwise. These are the clock which was designed to move backwards, and Benjamin himself. These figures appear to me as symbols which would seem to be stronger than Time itself. They seem to have resisted the standards of Time. Time always perceived itself as something which keeps moving forward, and never backwards. The two symbols have done differently. And this is something I regard as something extremely significant. It actually makes me think that maybe the film isn’t really telling us that Time is the most powerful of all. That maybe Time doesn’t have to be in control. That maybe, the circumstances that proved Time as the sole mover of Life are nothing compared to the symbols which represent Time as something which can be altered and opposed. And as I think about this, I am filled with so much relief. I was always taught since I was a child that Time is something linear. That it moves about a straight line. And now that I think about it, I really think that all of us are mistaken. Time is more of something that moves in circles, or probably something that is indefinite. And this is probably what the film is all about—Life is a whole lot larger than Time.
2/07/2009 04:01:00 PM
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