All that you can't leave behind

Rating: Null/10 (19 March 2001)

I saw Tom Hanks sell me this movie for the second time this previous saturday evening. When you watch a man 'cast away' every major component of his life... one by one... clothes,body fat, human contact, comfort, the pressure of time... a portion of sanity... and then see whats left behind.
The first act plane crash is phenomenal. You will NEVER take your shoes off in an airplane again... or be without a Leatherman tool. :-) When Chuck first lands on the island; i was made to feel like the island itself is a creature... a being... a thing that imprisons... it KEEPS you. On the horizon you COULD be free... but you CAN'T GET there. And you watch Chuck. Chuck is REAL. And so are His frustrations, his pain, his discomfort & his joy in triumph!!When he makes fire... I shouted with him. I, too, find myself wanting to get back to Kelly... to hear a human voice... to be warm at night... to not be thirsty anymore. Chuck's numerous transformations make me feel like i went through them with him. During the second act, after four years has passed... it felt like chuck had crawled into a cave... and what was left was "all that he couldn't leave behind" or throw away. Just ... surviving. Staying alive. Then one day the tide brings in his way off. In this film you will watch a man CHANGE. Tom Hanks makes me believe in a character like never before in a film. I BELIEVE him. I BELIEVE he has 'thrown overboard' every thing that was of no use to him in order to survive, in order to LIVE. "WhatEVER it takes to live" was what i thought about as i left the theater... and to ENJOY your life, and enjoy every LITTLE thing. Ice. Sheets. A cup of HOT coffee. Human touch. MUSIC! What if i couldn't listen to music for 4 years??? A kiss from a woman! ( again... 4 years? )Savoring every last good thing in my life. In the word's of U2, this film challenged me to, in my own life, throw overboard the worthless junk that will hinder me, and keep "all that i can't leave behind" ... and enjoy. Go see it. wait. And then see it again. *** By the way... ( and this is seen in the previews) When Chuck says at the beginning of the film;"We live or we die by The Clock!"... he has a pager with a clock, a digital watch, clocks in the warehouse etc.... and at the end ... notice he wears no watch.