zen. splendid beautiful breath of zen.

Rating: 9/10 (25 January 2000)

Look, regardless of this film's many technical merits or its Hollywood-created character types it is necessary... for everyone. Drive in to the theatre for a deeply moving, ethereal transcendent experience- then float away... That the screenplay features cliches we have learned to accept as the movies' version of real people is negligible. In my opinion, they are all stock skeletons given haunting performances by a divine troupe of actors; skeletons save our hero Kevin Spacey, in a role I've rarely seen perfected on screen (admonish my noviceness if you will - I don't deny there are other such films - but breathe. This is simply one of them: and at the moment, I review it alone). That one role I know, because he made tangible what I thought to be an intangible feeling of instant simultaneous, despair and joy.. catharsis.. Despair at a bad thing: but rise above it by suddenly realizing how little what you thought mattered actually matters - maybe the pointlessness of your own life. You rise up laughing above the tiny clowns at your feet, those who "don't get it", that's joy: but still despair for their and your present sad state. and the emotion of feeling itself. The film is like a resplendent poem with words you heard elsewhere - but not together and not in the same context. Now some poor guy said in his review something to the effect of "talks about beauty in everyday life. So what? What if we knew it already?" The film might not be revelatory, but like I said it is necessary, like sparkles on the sea, or a bag on the wind to be noticed in passing, rare hints of a greater purpose. There is naught but simplicity here. The tag is misleading: do not look closer. Look no closer than the nose on your face. Thinking will get you nowhere. It is a very emotional movie with tendrils from logical thought. If you follow them perhaps you find religion. Empty the mind. Try feeling nothing at-all. Beauty in sparity. Hold the bag in one place in your mind and release it to let it drift. Think not. I repeat, look no closer than the bag. No: not what the bag means. You're looking too hard. Just bag on wind. Wind and bag dance and leaves scuttle. You won't be surprised at what you find when you "figure it out." That's the point. Some say that when you die - God is like an old friend. The beauty is the film is beauty is truth, a la Keats... and there is truth to be found here. To me this movie was like someone whispering, comforting, sort of like love, except it was from without, not within, more ethereal, more removed. Like watching the stars from a night-lit boat; or listening to it snow. If you've never done these things, I advise it immediately. The film is only tragic if you miss the hope splattered blood-red on the kitchen wall. I think it means death is inevitable, of course it is. Everyone will die: but it is natural. There is hope if we shake off human burdens at least occasionally and understand it is all natural. Please read my review and tell me what you think. And don't forget to see the movie.