The Theme of "Mud"

            What is “Mud” really about? The answer to this question ought to give us the theme of the movie.

            In the first place, why is Mud called Mud, and why is the movie named after him? Tom Blankenship, the one person besides Juniper who has known him since he was a boy, says he didn’t have a daddy and nobody knows if he had a mama. He seems to have come into existence when Juniper saved him from snake bite by rushing him to the hospital. This happened when he was the age Ellis and Neckbone are now.

            We have two clues. One is the common expression, “or my name is mud.” The other is the muddy pit that Ellis falls into at the bottom of which are writhing, black snakes. Mud has a snake tattooed on his body. He has murdered the man who impregnated Juniper and then pushed her down the stairs, causing her to miscarry and possibly taking away her ability to have another baby. He says the man deserved to die. He himself isn’t a violent man, nor is he a snake. He’s neither treacherous nor cunning. He’s a creature of instinct, a survivor. In the human social world, he is a stupid, worthless creature like the snakes. Still, he makes a connection with Ellis. He saves his life by rushing him to the clinic; he sneaks into his bedroom to say goodbye—this puts the boy in danger when a vigilante posse opens fire on Mud; Mud throws Ellis to the floor and saves his life again.

            How does Ellis get himself into the middle of all this? How does his life become so entangled with Mud’s? (What happens when you fall into a viper’s pit?) It starts when he and Neckbone meet Mud on the island and Mud asks them to get him some food. He is hungry. Neckbone wants to be rid of the problem. Ellis says he’ll do it because “it’s the right thing to do.” There’s an interesting contrast between Ellis and Neckbone. Neckbone is always the one to bring up the topic of sex, while Ellis is circumspect in this area; Neckbone frequently uses the word “shit,” while Ellis never swears.

            Ellis is a dutiful boy, trying to be on time for his job of helping his father deliver packages of frozen catfish. His father is the kind of man who says, “Life is hard. That’s why I make you work hard.” Further, Ellis’ parents teach him to be law-abiding; they instruct him to return the outboard motor he and Neckbone have stolen (which turns out to be impossible). In contrast to Mud’s boyhood story, Ellis is being raised to be a man of worth.

            I think the theme of the movie, the idea that unifies it, the emotional center that anybody in the audience can identify with, is based on the fact of Mud’s existence. Mud puts Ellis’ life and his budding integrity in danger, yet they become friends.  The viewer asks: what does it take to be a person of worth?

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"Mud" and Genre

            I had no idea that movies were made to fit into genres. Yesterday my project was to view “Mud” and figure out how it was a coming-of-age story, which I had learned from a review.

            Genres are the patterns, forms, styles and structures that filmmakers depend on for the construction of films, and which audiences depend on to make sense of them (Johnston, 190). After I saw “Mud,” I glanced quickly at a website (it was almost time for dinner), which said: sex, loss, a rending of the veil of childhood illusions. I began to understand the patterns in coming-of-age films and remembered “Stand by Me.” I perceived: the protagonist has at least one pal; a chance occurrence draws the boys into a dangerous adult world; the protagonist boy’s emerging manhood is put to the test; a scene at the end underscores his successful negotiation of the threshold to manhood. With coming-of-age films, we are viewers of a ritual.

            The movie’s title gives the impression that it is about a renegade named Mud, who is hiding out on an island in the Mississippi River. Actually, Mud is the figure who opens the door to manhood for fourteen-year-old Ellis and his pal Neckbone. The boys go to the island to take possession of a boat that a flood has lodged high in a tree. Mud already lives there. By the end, Mud, sending the boys for supplies, has brought the boat to ground, repaired it, and escaped in it.

            During these few days, Ellis falls in love with the very attractive Meg Pearl, who gives him his first kiss. He discovers that his parents are going to separate and may divorce. And he finds out that the houseboat his family has occupied all his life is about to be seized and destroyed by the government. He has a lot to learn. Johnston advises viewers to note originality in filmmakers’ treatments of genre. In the realm of sex, Neckbone, who is being raised by his young, single uncle, is a source of information. But Ellis is an idealistic youngster who is more interested in the meaning of love between a man and a woman. As the movie progresses, this appears to him to be nothing but disaster. His parents split up; Neckbone has never known his own parents; Mud loves Juniper but they never get together; and Meg Pearl, who is a fully developed girl, bigger and older than Ellis, has a boyfriend her own age.

            Another pattern I perceived was wildness. The movie begins with the boys venturing into the wilderness of nature, where they meet the wild man, Mud. He inadvertently awakens the wild man in Ellis. An incredible four times Ellis socks a man in the jaw who is bigger and older than himself. Once he is slugged in return and gets a black eye. Then, along with Neckbone, he becomes a thief. The supplies they scrounge are from junkyards until finally they steal a working outboard motor. Ellis’ final assault is on Mud himself, who has turned his life upside down. He runs away and falls into a pit of cottonmouth snakes, where, when one of the snakes bites him, the wilderness turns on him.

            To be continued….

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How to Watch a Movie

            How should we watch a movie if we’re looking for experiences deeper than what we’ve had before? For ways to say more than, “It was good,” or “It stank to high heaven”?

Paul Ricoeur’s three stages of belief suggest a path. The stage I’ve been in, with respect to movies, is first naïveté, the uncritical, childlike acceptance of whatever the filmmaker has to give me. Now I’m collecting equipment for engaging in critical reflection, the second stage. However, I don’t want to continue standing at a distance from movies; I want to enjoy them. This calls for second naïveté, a combination of acceptance and reflection. For Johnston, the ideal situation is to experience a movie fully and reflect on it later; but I wonder whether, once we are wise to techniques of storytelling and moviemaking, it is possible to separate experience and reflection. The thing is to become a happy philosopher!

Critical reflection on the movies requires understanding at least these points:

Movies tell stories in three ways: images, words and music. All of these are happening when we watch a movie.

Stories are composed of several elements: character, plot, setting, theme, tone, mood, point of view, and something Johnson calls atmosphere, the inevitable “givens.” (I wonder if he means context?) “Admission” focuses on the character of Portia Nathan and her dilemma when she meets the boy she thinks is her son. In a character-driven story, the character is often changed by the challenge he or she meets. “Oblivion” is plot-centered: how will the alien threat be resolved?

Stories have a three-part structure. Johnston calls these Acts 1, 2 and 3; but I prefer a homemade definition. Stories start with a situation of stability. It may not be peace and light; in a war movie, a battle; in a murder mystery, a dead body. Nevertheless, a story starts with a place for the viewer or reader to stand. Then a conflict arises, disrupting stability. Usually, it is that the main character is presented with a challenge. In “Schindler’s List,” what happens when Oscar Schindler recognizes the humanity of the concentration camp detainees? Finally, there is resolution, which may go well or badly for the main character. The first and third parts are much shorter than the middle one.

Movies fall into four categories, which can overlap: realism, fantasy, entertainment and education.

They appear in a gazillion genres: love story, romantic comedy, screwball comedy, science fiction, thriller, detective story, gangster film, Western, horror film, etc. Each genre follows certain conventions, which help the viewer to make sense of the story. In “Oblivion,” there is the expected clash between humanity and an extraterrestrial intelligence. In “Admission,” a romantic comedy, Portia and John fall in love.

A movie is constructed of cuts and shots. Cuts refer to the editing of the movie; they are concerned with the use of time. Shots refer to the framing of its scenes; they are concerned with the use of space. Last night I practiced looking for cuts and shots while watching a Hercule Poirot mystery on television.

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Oblivion

            In Reel Spirituality, Robert Johnston answers the question, Why look at film? from a theological perspective: “If viewers will join in community with a film’s storyteller, letting the movie’s images speak with their full integrity, they might be surprised to discover that they are hearing God as well” (100). When I saw “Oblivion” this weekend, I was fixated on the middle part of his statement. Being open to what a movie has to say before attempting to analyze it is a persistent theme of his. However, what it means to me to be “open” has changed since I came upon his book.

            For example, I read a review of “Oblivion” before going to the theater, something I never used to do. It suggested that it might be hard for a viewer to get around the Tom Cruiseness of Tom Cruise. Morgan Freeman, another icon, is also in the movie. I had the opportunity to say, You know what? These guys are just actors. They're paid to facilitate the story. What a feeling of freedom this gave me! The movie was well produced and told a good story. The actors were never a distraction.

            “Movies, like life itself,” Johnston writes, “are first experienced, then reflected on. They affect the heart, then the head” (250). “Oblivion” certainly hit me in the realm of experience. It’s a post-apocalyptic science fiction thriller in which aliens (subtly presented; no guys wearing rubber masks) have taken control of Earth. A band of human beings has taken refuge underground. In one crowd scene, a small boy pushes to the front to see what is going on. Babies and small children always get to me; I started to cry. In other places, when the drama became overwhelming, I reminded myself that the movie fell deeply into the fantasy category on Johnston’s range-of-cinema matrix. So, was I not completely open to its images?

            Later I remembered reading about “second naivete.” The blog Big Other says it better than I can: “Consider the ‘second naïveté,’ a theological concept derived from the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur. It refers to a stage of belief that, in contrast to the ‘first naïveté’ (characterized by uncritical, childlike acceptance), can only be achieved after passing through an intensely rational or critical stage. So that three stages can appear—the first naïveté, the critical distance, and the second naïveté (a sort of return to, and maturation of, the first).”

First naïveté’ is the condition I used to insist on with respect to the movies. It is sometimes called the pre-critical stage. Critical reflection is the stage that became available with the option of taking the theology course in June. It is characterized by an attitude of distance. Second naïveté’ includes the consequences of passing through the first two stages. I was not able to watch “Oblivion” without resorting to reflection, but even while I was calling it a fantasy I was in tune with its story. It was like waking up in a dream and knowing I was dreaming.

            Big Other applies the idea of the three stages to the artistic life of Syd Barrett, a founding member of the Pink Floyd band.

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A Critical Apparatus

            A critical apparatus is a structure of thought that enables one to approach a topic on its own terms. So, for instance, in my Introduction to Theology class, one of the first things our professor gave us was a list of definitions. We had to start learning the language that theologians use.

            Of theology textbooks, Reel Spirituality is among the clearest and most down-to-earth that I’ve read, but there are still terms I need to look into more deeply. They are important to Johnston’s argument. For example, he speaks of transcendence quite a bit. He asks the question, are movies art? He emphasizes the dialogical methodology of his book. He writes about the dialogue between theology and culture. He asserts that a work of art seeks to initiate a dialogue with its audience.

            In this post, I want to go directly to the critical apparatus he provides to moviegoers with a “theological interest.” His suggestions are based on the nature of story and how movies employ the elements of story. Last time, I talked about words, music and images. Movies use a variety of artistic methods to tell a story. I talked about what Johnston calls the “range of cinema” and the four-part grid he uses to illustrate this.

Here are more perspectives:

A movie script typically has a three-part structure. In act 1, “the protagonist is offered a new challenge.” In act 2, “the challenge produces conflict, which escalates throughout the act until a crisis is reached.” In act 3, the protagonist meets or fails to meet the challenge.

A story has four constitutive parts: character, plot, atmosphere, and tone, which Johnston prefers to call point of view. By atmosphere, he means “the unalterable given(s) against which the story is told and the characters developed… the unchanging backdrop against which the story is played out.” “Using [this] critical apparatus,” he writes, “the movie-viewer with theological interest is often able to focus attention where it first belongs—on the film itself—and to respond to the movie from its own center.”

            Another perspective is the “story’s critical circle.” This also has four parts. “An adequate critical theory of film will take into account not only (1) the movie itself, but also (2) the filmmakers lying behind and expressed through it, (3) the viewers with their own life stories that help interpret it, and (4) the larger universe, or worldview, that shapes the story’s presentation.”

            Reading these things reminded me of “Admission.” In voice-overs, Portia Nathan summarizes its point of view. She says, at the beginning: “Students want to know what the magic formula is for getting accepted to Princeton.” And at the end: “There is no formula. Just be yourself.” The story ends with her telling her life story to a personnel director. She tries to contact the boy she gave up for adoption. John learns that Nelson wants to stay put, not move to another country. The movie seeks to convince us that just being ourselves is the best thing.

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Admission

“Admission” is the story of Portia Nathan (Tina Fey), an admissions officer at Princeton University. She has held her job for sixteen years. She has never been married.

On an trip to an experimental high school called Quest, to explain Princeton’s admissions policies to the students, Portia meets a teacher, John Pressman; his twelve-year-old son Nelson; and a boy who wants to apply to Princeton, Jeremiah Balakian. John adopted Nelson when he lived in Uganda; Jeremiah is also an adopted child. Portia has never wanted children and doesn’t particularly like them, so it is with some resistance that she takes John’s news that Jeremiah is the baby she gave up for adoption eighteen years before. Then her maternal instincts arise; she pushes hard with the admissions committee to have Jeremiah accepted. He is a brilliant human being, a self-described autodidact, but his school record is abysmal and he is rejected. Portia sneaks into the office at night and substitutes the Accept label from the folder of a student who is opting for Yale, for the Deny label on Jeremiah’s folder. He is admitted, but she loses her job. Then she learns that Jeremiah is not the baby she gave away. She is not left with nothing; she and John are in love.

I went to the movie with the goal of remembering an emphasis in Reel Spirituality, that movies are made not only of words in a script but also of music (or sound) and image. The images in movies are primary. Movies are a visual medium. It’s probably more accurate to say that story is primary. Script, music and image serve the story, which is why the viewer goes to a movie in the first place. I noted that “Admission,” while the screen was still dark, begins with light, bouncy music; after this I was mostly unconscious of music and sound. The script answers the question, What would a woman do if she unexpectedly met the young person she gave away as a baby? There was nothing startling about the imagery. Script, imagery and casting made Jonathan and Nelson the most appealing characters, the only ones I cared about and wanted to know more about. It’s a light, bouncy movie.

In Reel Spirituality, Robert K. Johston presents a simple diagram to illustrate the many different kinds of movie. It consists of a horizontal line crossed by a vertical line. The extreme left represents entertainment, the extreme right education. The extreme top is realism; at the bottom is fantasy. “Admission” lands in the quadrant described by fantasy and entertainment. It’s not a realistic picture of university admissions practices nor, to my mind, of maternal instincts. It doesn’t attempt to lead the viewer into an unusual experience.

It was an odd coincidence that Paco and I went to a movie that included a matter of ethics just as I am starting to cogitate on theology and ethics at the movies. Too bad the ethics plot point in “Admission” wasn’t dramatized more interestingly as a dilemma.

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Terms

Here are terms that will be useful in a discussion of theology, ethics and the movies.

Discernment. The dictionary defines discernment as keen perception or judgment; insight; acumen. As a spiritual practice, discernment "is a decision-making process that honors the place of God’s will in our lives. It is an interior search that seeks to align our own will with the will of God in order to learn what God is calling us to. Every choice we make, no matter how small, is an opportunity to align ourselves with God’s will.”

Art refers to creative work or its principles; a making or doing of things that display form, beauty, and unusual perception; art includes painting, sculpture, architecture, music, literature, drama, the dance—and the movies.

Genre refers to “different types of varieties of literature or media. In the interpretation of texts, particularly the Bible, most exegetes agree that identifying the genre of the text to be interpreted is crucial and that the text must be understood in light of the common conventions that typified that genre at the time of its writing. Thus, poetry is not to be interpreted in the same manner as historical narrative, nor is prophecy properly read in the same manner as an epistle (letter)” (Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms, by Grenz et al, 55). Although this blog is a discussion of the genre of movies, not writings in the Bible, the definition is useful in emphasizing the importance of interpretive conventions with respect to a genre.

A text, in narrative theory, is “a finite structured whole composed of language signs. It is directly accessible. The meanings, effects, functions and background presented in the text are not finite” (from a website that is no longer accessible). Most definitions of text restrict it to the printed word. This one allows for an understanding of the spoken words in a movie.

Theology, generally speaking, is a “religious belief system about God or ultimate reality. Theology commonly refers to the ordered, systematic study or interpretation of the Christian faith and experience of God based on God’s divine self-revelation. Theology also seeks to apply these truths to the full breadth of human experience and thought” (Grenz et al, 113). In Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue, Robert K. Johnston explores the idea of a theology of the movies.

Ethics. This is the biggie. The term ethics refers to the “area of philosophical and theological inquiry into what constitutes right and wrong, that is, morality, as well as what is the good and the good life. Ethics seeks to provide insight, principles or even a system of guidance in the quest of the good life or in acting rightly in either general or specific situations of life. Broadly speaking, ethical systems are either deontological (seeking to guide behavior through establishment or discovery of what is intrinsically right and wrong) or teleological (seeking to guide behavior through an understanding of the outcomes or ends that ethical decisions and behavior bring about)” (Grenz et al, 47).

Movies and the Dreamer

They say it takes three months to change a habit. Well, I have a habit of forgetfulness where movies are concerned. I’m talking about the fact that, if someone takes me by surprise and says, “Seen any good movies lately?” I am likely to draw a blank. I often don’t remember having seen a movie; I watch it again and halfway through realize it looks familiar. Something happens when I watch movies. I sink into them and surrender to them. A bad movie is one that won’t let me forget I’m sitting in a theater watching a movie.

There are scenes in some movies that are so startling and vivid that they print the movie on my memory. It was probably the raining frogs that did it in “Magnolia.” The impossibility of such an event. Only recently did I read the scientific explanation for the phenomenon of raining frogs (or crickets or lizards). And only now does it occur to me that the device was a metaphor underlining the movie’s message. The impossible can happen; people can be healed of the deepest wounds. Some movies I remember because they are connected to external events, like playing hooky to go to “The Trouble With Harry.” The ones in between are like dreams. They retreat to my unconscious.

The thing is, I believe in the value of surrendering to a narrative, whether it is a movie, fiction in print, the story someone tells me about him or herself, or various forms of non-fiction. How can I judge the validity or truth of a narrative until I have let it wash through me?

Let’s say I have three months to think about this, April 12^th to July 12^th. The theology and movies course will meet on the Saturdays of June. It will intensify my exploration. Here’s the question. What parts of my habit of forgetfulness aren’t a good thing? It’s bothered me since my children were teenagers that movies present fundamental life options to people who may not have the maturity or integrity to weigh them wisely. Where do I belong in this picture? How ought I to respond in such situations?

Last weekend Paco and I watched “The Shipping News” (2001). He remembered seeing it, but I didn’t. It opens with a scene in which the central character, Quoyle, is shown as a child. His father tosses him into a lake to teach him how to swim and cruelly taunts him as he sputters and chokes in the water. He reacts by sinking placidly beneath the surface, where life is so hard. His body morphs into his adult self, who is played by Kevin Spacey. Quoyle floats in the water without moving his limbs and looks at the viewer with a soft smile on his face. This is who I have been, I, the moviegoer.

The Movies and Me

My life in the movies began at a young age. I was born in 1939, the year Judy Garland appeared in "The Wizard of Oz." Not that my parents took me to see it on the way home from the hospital, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had. Going to the movies was a part of life in those days.

I remember that my mother took me to every Margaret O’Brien movie that was made. She was a year older than I and apparently a template for my mother and me; she was the reason I wore braids until I was ten and pined to be a ballerina. I really do wonder if, in her wide-eyed, earnest delivery, her extreme articulateness and her evident—at least to me—position at the center of things, she affected the shaping of my personality.

I also remember hearing my mother go out the door with my brothers to see “Uncle Remus”—while I stayed at home with the mumps; seeing “Gone With the Wind” with my brothers at the Senator Theater in Washington when I was about ten; watching Batman serials with my brothers; playing hooky when I was a junior in high school, at my mother’s suggestion, to go with her to “The Trouble With Harry;” giving up popcorn when I went with my father, after he got false teeth; seeing movies in New Orleans after I was married; being hugely pregnant with my first baby when I went with my sister to watch “What’s New, Pussycat?” To this day, my week isn’t complete until I’ve watched a movie on Saturday night, either in the theater, which I prefer, or at home, where the choices are often better.

The last sentence reflects a change in my movie-viewing attitudes. It used to be, I would watch anything. Now, I avoid movies depicting extreme violence. Paco and I left “Hurt Locker” after the first twenty-five minutes because I was sitting there with my eyes covered. I refused even to consider going to “Zero Dark Thirty.” I hated “Pulp Fiction” because the characters took murder so lightly. I won’t see movies about the mob. Paco doesn’t like fantasy or a Holocaust theme, so I go to those movies by myself. Surprisingly, it was his idea a week ago to watch “Life of Pi” on demand. We were both blown away.

The prospect of taking a course called “Theology and Ethics at the Movies” appealed to me at once, first of all because it is the first invitation I’ve received to stand back and look at my movie-going, which is so second-nature it is almost like breathing. There’s also my need to interrogate, or perhaps I should say articulate, a feeling I’ve had, which I think must have started with “Pulp Fiction,” “Boys Don’t Cry” and “Magnolia.” All my life I’d taken the movies for granted as something fun to do. Now, in my sixties and seventies, some of them were saying, “Pay attention to me. I have something to say.”

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