Bored With Being Bored

Rating: Null/10 (10 March 2004)

What is one to do when life's amusement aids aren't amusing enough? Television seem silly? Amusement arcades lacking in thrills? Partying down seem to be sorely lacking in real communication? In a culture suffocating in either boredom-killing, thrill-seeking, or mind-numbing comfort, what is left for one to do? That is the question this film never really asks, which is why it ends up being an extension of the very thing it seems to be rebelling against. Instead, it asks, `what shall I be?', as if finding one's vocation in life is as simple as slipping into a Halloween costume.

It is the liberty of world-wise, well-educated, wealthy people to wallow in angst if they so choose, since those who have to work for a living have to wallow in paying bills and keeping a job before they can fret about what they're going to be one day. Well-traveled rich folks who stay in four star hotels have their problems too, but the choices are wide open if they have a passion for something. The stars of this film (both beautifully realized by Bill Murray and Scarlet Johannson) have lost their passion, that is, if they ever had any passions in the first place. It is common for young people to go through phases of interest, such as photography or horses, as young Scarlet mentions. But interest isn't passion, and it is passion that she is looking for (and I don't mean the carnal kind). Unfortunately, her ability to see beyond her own little world is strongly disabled. The one area the film stays clear of is the world outside the orderly, mechanized, consumer-oriented culture. There's a whole other world out there, but the film doesn't allow the characters to notice or acknowledge that world because that would make audiences feel too uncomfortable. If the film dared to have the characters ask, `what shall I DO?', it would have to answer with the obvious solution: stop surfing trough TV channels, watch the news, find an injustice (there are thousands from which to chose) and dedicate your life to fighting that injustice. The problem with this film is that it creates wonderful, intelligent characters, but puts them in a film that they themselves would walk out of if they were watching it.

There's an ironic scene in this film where Scarlet and Bill are watching `La Dolce Vita' on TV. The scene they happen to be watching is of course, one with the voluptuous and vivacious Anita Eckberg. That's what everyone remembers about that film. What lots of folks forget is the scene near the end where a professor kills his family and himself for no apparent reason. Had THIS film had the energy and integrity to follow through on its theme, it would have shown Scarlet and Bill watching that scene, and it would have shown their reaction to it. Numbness isn't desperation or pain, it's just numbness. One has to feel suffering in order for things like hope, justice, and compassion to break through that wall of numbing indifference. Bill Murray's character is the standard issue male menopause victim, and he plays that sort of part better than anyone else, in fact it seems as if he just hopped from the screen of `Rushmore' into this screen. But he is the fulcrum that is inevitably supposed to launch Scarlet into a new mode of thinking. It seems he needs to do little other than show up with a fuzzy stuffed owl and an adorable look on his face in order to for her to start feeling differently. That's nice, but the film's saccharine ending pulls a major cop-out when even the writer-director can't come up with the words that might be necessary to help point her in a new direction. Instead, we get `something' whispered in her ear that leaves her in bittersweet tears and leaves the audience sighing, `isn't that romantic?' as they wander out of the cinema in yet another layer of sticky-sweet movie glaze that makes the trip to the mall always so pleasureful. That's fine for a film that promises nothing more, but this film betrays its characters and its audience so thoroughly, it's unforgivable. It dared to reveal a very real sickness that has permeated our society (amusement aids, comfort, consumerism...) and offered us a `get well' balloon as a path to enlightenment. Sleep well, America.