pushing children

Rating: 8/10 (23 September 2006)

I found the film to be excellent. As for the reviews and psychoanalyses, I find the film to represent a typical human story -- of parent wanting the best for a child, but in essence causing harm --and of a child wanting to be whom he/she is. It is so easy to blame parents, for they are human, and thus fallible. Anyone who has had children, and who reflects on the experience of parenting many years later (e.g., as a grandparent), wishes s/he had done things differently. Yet children tend to emerge as they will--into beings with their own interests, desires, and aptitudes nevertheless. A good reminder can be found in Gibran's philosophies. The archetypal stories of Shine endure beyond the specifics.