For what it's worth, it's never too late or, in
my case, too early to be whoever you want to be. There's no time limit; stop
whenever you want. You can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this
thing.
- Benjamin
Button
Was that it?
This was what I asked when I first saw this
movie. As in, was that the whole thing? Where was the seething anger, the
patriarchal disconnection, the general cynicism that had become so trademark
Fincher? What was the point of sitting through three hours of Brad Pitt
drifting through life only to arrive at an ending that we all knew was
inevitable from the beginning?
It was a cynical viewpoint to be sure. And
clearly, I was not the most impressed. And yet the film remained stuck in my
mind, begging for me to revisit its ideas, urging me to reconsider its merit.
So naturally, I gave in. And curiously, upon repeat viewings, I came to the
conclusion that my initial feelings of inadequacy and insignificance did not
change. Alas, it dawned on me that this feeling of powerlessness was precisely
the point of Fincher’s most audacious film to date.
This is all there is to life, nothing more than
a collection of emotions and memories, fleeting yet evocative. But we choose
where to go and what to do. And more importantly, we choose who to let in – and
out – of our lives. And when the end comes, we are left staggering from a
profound sense of having seen and lived things we hadn’t before. And although
we are well aware of our impending end, that knowledge never stops us from
enjoying the time we have. Indeed, it only encourages us to cherish the
journey. And just like any good work of art, that should be what a good life
comprises.
It’s interesting to note that the film as we
know it almost never existed. Stuck in production hell for decades, the project
gathered dust as producers, writers, and directors came and went. That is,
until Fincher resurrected it from its tomb. To me, this knowledge only makes Benjamin Button all the more sweet as it
represents the single point in Fincher’s career when he evolved from a punk
provocateur to a mature storyteller. Gone was the brash visionary on Alien 3 who so infamously proclaimed that
he’d rather get colon cancer than make another studio movie. Gone was the
seething controversialist who crafted the millennial angst-driven Fight Club. Gone was the man who stuffed Gwyneth
Paltrow’s head in a box. Gone too, I had originally thought, was the cynical
life views and fascination with male amateurish disobedience. Except, it really
wasn’t; it was all still in plain sight, only more refined. Fincher had adopted
a new storytelling gravitas, a new maturity to his art. And all it took for
Fincher to grow up was a film about growing young.
In many ways, Benjamin
Button goes against established
rules of dramatic storytelling. The biggest anomaly is its lack of an
antagonist, an aspect of storytelling with which Fincher had toyed in his
previous outings. But here, nothing blatantly stops Benjamin from doing what he
wants. Nothing stops him from seeing who he wants and going where he wants. In
fact, nothing limits any character in the film from doing, quite simply,
anything. Indeed, characters follow their dreams and spread their wings as
people in real life do. Some characters succeed; some characters fail. This is
surely the point critics of this film will bring up as “boring” or “pointless.”
And indeed, they have a good argument. If nothing limits any of the characters,
what’s the point? With no struggles, why tell a story?
But the key to this view is that Benjamin, no
matter how extraordinary, is still victim to time, to age, to death. And in
many ways, this is the ultimate human opponent, the great obstacle that even
the most intelligent or eloquent or heroic individual can’t beat.
So, it’s no surprise that for a film which
builds its premise around the idea of reversing and more specifically,
preserving, time, time itself should provide the entirety of the conflict in
the story. And what better way to breed chaos in a world established around the
passing of time than to have a central character live outside those rules?
Benjamin is, in some ways, the ultimate provocateur – simple, docile, and
seemingly innocent. But inside, there is a passion for life, a disregard for
limits. The film almost argues that the most volatile anarchist is not the
teenager spray-painting the walls outside the Vatican; it’s actually the
inconspicuous old man blindly roaming the halls from within.
Maybe that’s why Benjamin’s
life story seems so captivating. The film's subtle knack for lawlessness
doesn't come from its plot; rather, it stems from Benjamin's
When I watch this film, I can't
help but think of the day when I'll lose those who are most important in my own
life. Surely, a three-hour meditation on mortality can do that to a person. But
if someone as socially disinterested as Fincher can admit that the very themes
of death and helplessness drew him to the project, I don’t feel so alone in my
soul-bearing ways. Indeed, Fincher had just recently lost his own father
before taking on this project, recalling that "When you lose someone who
helped form you in lots of ways, who is your 'true north', you lose the
barometer of your life. You're no longer trying to please someone, or you're no
longer reacting against something. In many ways, you're truly alone." And
in many ways, you surely lose that sense of stability, of direction. But like
in so many of Fincher’s creations, something profound – and often unforgettable
– stems from the chaos in all our lives; the key is simply if we recognize it
or let it tick away.
