Avalon Lost: Suburbanization and Its Discontents in Barry Levinson's Avalon

Barry Levinson's film Avalon (1990) dramatizes the changes that occur over time among the Krichinskys, a Jewish-American family of East European heritage in mid-twentieth-century Baltimore. Levinson said of his film that "'Avalon'. . . dealt with the 50's- the rise of television and the demise of the family storyteller, viewed through the prism of a large Jewish family coming apart at the seams" (qtd. in Yagoda 30). Levinson's depiction in Avalon of the corrosive impact of suburbanization on family life in America represents a deepening and enriching of his exploration of a community changing over time- a theme he had previously set forth in his earlier Baltimore films Diner (1982) and Tin Men (1987). Whereas Diner and Tin Men had told straightforward, linear stories that unfold over a period of a few days in the lives of the main characters, Avalon draws additional dramatic power by moving back and forth in time as it explores the differing impact of suburbanization on different generations of the Krichinsky family. Levinson's portrayal of that process of generational change shows how an artist who returns repeatedly to the social and cultural setting that inspired his or her creative impulses can find his or her vision of that setting, and of human character and behavior generally, growing more perceptive and more profound over time. An Avalon of the Mind Levinson once said that in Avalon he had wanted to chronicle "the move to suburbia and the changing economics of it and the impact on the extended family . . . how that extended family broke up" ("Films of Barry Levinson"). In pursuit of that vision, Levinson structures this narrative around family celebrations on Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July, two quintessentially American holidays that complement one another well; Independence Day "stands for individual freedom and opportunity," while Thanksgiving "marks the communal nature of immigrant life in America," with its emphasis on extended family gathering together for an elaborate and festive holiday meal (Cavalcanti and Schleef 12). The film's title refers to a neighborhood that did not exist except in Levinson's imagination, though there was an Avalon movie theatre in the Baltimore of Levinson's youth (Goldman 110). Levinson told a New York Times interviewer that he was being deliberately ambiguous about not specifically grounding Avalon in any identifiable place, stating that "What Avalon is supposed to be is the time when things were good" (qtd. in Rothstein 23). Levinson also said that he found the term Avalon "interesting in terms of King Arthur, that there was this mythical place, an earthly paradise . . . . perhaps something English, but something that's lost" (qtd. in Thompson 106, 108). The First Generation: Urban-Based Family Cohesiveness Avalon begins in 1948, with a Thanksgiving Day celebration being shared by the four Krichinsky brothers- Gabriel, Nathan, Hymie, and Sam- and their families. As the film opens, Sam Krichinsky (played by Armin Mueller-Stahl) recalls entering Baltimore on the Fourth of July, 1914, and marveling as fireworks lit up the night sky of his new home. Sam thus describes his entry into Baltimore: I came to America in 1914 ... .1 got off the boat, and then I came to Baltimore. It was the most beautiful place you've ever seen in your life. There were lights everywhere- what lights they had! It was a celebration of lights. I thought they were for me: "Sam was in America!" I didn't know what holiday it was, but there were lights, and I walked under them. A gentle sense of nostalgia is established by the film's early passages; while Gabriel, the eldest brother, seems a bit bossy in his insistence that only he is correct about elements of family tradition- e.g., the year in which the Krichinsky family paterfamilias came to America, or whether the father ever drank water- the brothers' enjoyment of each other's company and of the family fellowship of the Thanksgiving holiday is evident. …