Engaging Culture

I live in Louisville, Kentucky. And I love this city, but every year thousands of people descend upon the city to watch a bunch of beasts run around a track for two minutes. Most of them have had a few too many mint juleps, and are too drunk by the time the race actually starts to even know what’s going on. I don’t particularly care about the Kentucky Derby, but I’m sure that I’ll be working overtime this weekend covering for people who do. And even though I don’t care about the race, I can’t help but be intrigued by the story of the only horse to ever run the 1 1/4 mile race at Churchill Downs in less than 2 minutes. This is the most famous horse in the world, except maybe Mr. Ed, ESPN gave him the honor of being the 35th greatest athlete in the past century, and now there is a movie telling his wonderful story.

It’s set to hit theaters on October 8th, and it looks like it’s all the movie that Seabiscuit wanted to be. From director Randall Wallace (The Man in the Iron Mask, We Were Soldiers) comes the true story of Penny Chenery (Diane Lane), a modest housewife who agrees to take over her father’s thoroughbred stables despite her lack of horse-racing knowledge. In true underdog fashion, she and her horse, Secretariat, with the help of veteran trainer Lucien Laurin (John Malkovich), manage to navigate the business and the track, culminating in the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years. Check out the trailer below and safely enjoy the derby this weekend.
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Once upon a time, Jennifer Lopez actually gave me hope that she could be a quality actress. That was back when she took roles in movies like Selena and Out of Sight, before she fell prey to the desire to be popular and took roles in God awful movies like Gigli and Monster-in-Law. However, she’s been off the big screen for four years and I had high hopes that perhaps that break was what she needed to get some sense. Oh, how wrong I was.

The Back-up Plan was the worse piece of drivel that she’s created yet. The worst part is that the concept isn’t a completely bad one. A woman is fed-up with men to the point that she has decided to forgo men all together and “start a family” (a.k.a. have a child) on her own. But she meets the man of her dreams only moments later and must confront him with that information. However, unlike most rom-coms, this one doesn’t put that revelation in the third act only to have him run out and then come crawling back for the final kiss. Instead, it is about this woman and her issues. She tells him and he sticks around and genuinely loves and cares for her, but she has been bitten by so many bad relationships with men that she is always paranoid that around the next curve, he is going to come to his senses and leave. She has issues with being loved, and don’t we all.

But this great concept for what could have been a phenomenal film turned into a game of let’s watch the beautiful girl make a fool out of herself with poop and vomit jokes. I don’t want to go into just how bad it is. I will simply put it this way, my wife and I have three small children and while all of the gags involve things that we deal with regularly either as parents or a couple there were several times when my wife had to turn away to keep from throwing up.

When you add to the un-funny humor the fact that there is almost no chemistry between Lopez and Alex O’Loughlin this movie goes from failure to disaster. The most awful part is that I am getting word that actual people in actual theaters have sat down and watched this movie and laughed and enjoyed it. These people inhabit a world that I am not remotely interested in visiting. Ladies, if you are watching this movie hoping that Stan “The Goat-Farming Man” might just step out into your lives, forget about it. A man that perfect doesn’t exist on this green planet. Oh, sorry, he does have a flaw… he’s in night school! That’s right the worst part about him is that he is bettering himself by going to school at night. He is a ruggedly handsome, leather jacket wearing, goat farmer, complete with tractor (which he rides shirtless and covered in baby oil). He lives just outside of the city, making his organic cheeses, but is always conveniently in the city at a trendy farmer’s market. There is no conflict in this film, it is a daydream for mentally unstable women, preaching you the lie that there is a perfect guy out there who will complete you in every way.

I had hopes and they were smashed to pieces. But I didn’t leave without some deeper insights into myself and the human condition. How could I not, the whole film is about how screwed up this girl is. And when you think about it, we’re all screwed up the same way. The Bible says that we’ve all sinned. We’ve all bought into the lie that this world has what we want, and we have had our hearts and spirits broken. I know that I’ve felt like Zoe, that I wasn’t worth God’s love. I wake up every day wondering if he has left me and forsaken me, despite the fact that he told me he never will (Hebrews 13:5). Because I’m not worth it. When I look at the stars and the galaxies and the beauties of this earth and then I look in the mirror, I think that God has much better things to do with his time than to love me. The hard journey of a Christian is not to earn God’s love, but to accept it. We will never deserve it, but he gives it freely. Conceptually, I give it a 90, but for dunking my hopes in the toilet and then pooping on them, I give it a 40.

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Most people expect to see movies geared at the feminine coming out on Mother’s Day. Well, unless mom is watching Iron Man 2 like millions of other people on Mother’s Day, she really can’t miss. I already told you about Babies, the new documentary, but now director Rodrigo Garcia (Nine Lives) is coming out with a new film about the unfolding drama of the intersecting lives of three women who are each affected in some way by adoption.

In Mother and Child, a 14 year-old girl has sex, gets pregnant, and gives up her baby for adoption. We meet this woman forty years later in the present day, her name is Karen (Annette Bening), and she is bitter and emotionally closed off having never gotten over giving up her child. She is caring for her dying mother and after mom dies, she is left alone with her guilt and pain. As you might expect, we also meet the daughter that she gave up at 14, her name is Elizabeth (Naomi Watts). She is now a beautiful and successful lawyer. Finally, we meet Lucy (Kerry Washington) who is having trouble conceiving with her husband, and is turning to adoption to help her create the family she desires.

I’m not sure what it is about our society and adoption, it seems like the only time we hear about it is when Madonna or Angelina are pining after third-world babies or an unsatisfied parent sends their adopted son back to an orphanage in Russia. It’s always the sensational, negative, and shocking that gets the story. And while I don’t think that this film is addressing adoption with such prejudice or sensationalism, I don’t think it is giving the full picture of what adoption is really all about. I’m sure that this film will not do well at the box office, but the critics will love it, it gives a handful of female actors a chance to shine in hopes of winning Oscar gold. It will be weepy and filled with all sorts of emotional turmoil, but the one thing I don’t think it will have is insight into what adoption really feels like.

As Christians we are adopted, loved by a Father who cares about us. Adoption is a picture in scripture of redemption, that which is unwanted and useless becoming priceless and filled with worth. That is how we feel being adopted as His sons and daughters. But this movie isn’t about adoption, as much as it circles around that topic, it is about women. It is about the emotions that go along with motherhood. It is about three women who are looking for fulfillment in something that can never satisfy, and their struggle to pull their lives together. Maybe if I had a baby I would be happy, maybe if I knew my real mother everything would be alright, maybe if I could reunite with the baby I gave up in my teenage pregnancy, then I could be fulfilled. It’s all about the mess that we as sinful people make of life and family. It should give us a glimpse of our desperate need for help.
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Opening up alongside Iron Man 2 is a distinct new documentary, perfect for it’s Mother’s Day weekend slot. The film, Babies, is a documentary without dialogue. That’s right, Morgan Freeman’s voice won’t be telling you what to think. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the film’s French director, Thomas Balmes said, “I don’t want to do the work for the audience, I don’t want to tell them what to get out of the movie.” The movie however is not 2 hours of Anne Geddes photo shoots. Cuteness was not his goal. The film is poignant, funny and sometimes disturbing as it explores the first year of the lives of four infants being raised under vastly different circumstances.

The film takes a deep look at third-world child rearing techniques against our Western techniques. The San Francisco parents, are a model of progressive parenting, at-home birth, and vegetarian diet for their baby daughter, Hattie. That is a big difference from the more primitive and often hazardous conditions in Mongolia or Namibia, where the challenges aren’t choosing the right stroller or bouncy seat, but much more basic problems, like finding non-polluted water.

Balmes continues, “All the parents are doing totally different things, with totally different tools, to make sure their children are growing up in the best way possible.”

In another interview Balmes was asked, “Now that you’ve made the film, is there anything that… you would do differently as a parent?” his response to me sums up the purpose of this film and his hopes as the film-maker. “What happens between parent and child is so crucial, and I hope our film reminds people of that. Sometimes, with life happening, you can get a little lazy in developing a real relationship with your kids. I myself have. I hope Babies shows that no matter what their conditions are, wherever they live, these babies grow up happy as long as they are loved, and that this is universal.”

I hope all of you moms and dads have a happy Mother’s Day. I give Babies a predicted score of 78, you can check out the trailer for Babies below or see others clips and featurettes at TrailerAddict.com.
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