What Makes a Movie Great?

I just saw "Million Dollar Baby" last night. I thought it was magnificent. While leaving the theater, I was surprised/shocked to hear some people were not as enthusiastic as me. I overheard remarks like "overrated", "ok - good, not great", "contrived ending". Hello? This film is a masterpiece! Are we from different planets or what? Sometimes I wonder if people are reluctant to jump on the "everyone says this is a great movie" bandwagon? Or, maybe other people just enjoy panning films that everyone else likes and prefer raving about those that no one else really understands. Being different, heralding the underdog, whatever. But, I petulantly digress.

What I really want to talk about is why I loved this film and more generally what makes a film great? First, "Million Dollar Baby" is NOT a boxing movie. Boxing is just the backdrop used to explore the most basic of human feelings, longings and relationships. Enough beating around the bush (no pun intended). Here's my list of qualities that make a film great:

• It stays in your head long after the last reel. Often for days or weeks or years. An example is one of my all time favorites - "The Hustler". If you somehow missed this classic with Paul Newman and George C. Scott at the top of their game, please rent it. You won't be sorry. It's a bit premature to judge "Million Dollar Baby" by this criterion, but it's certainly still on my mind the day after - witness this long blog by an infrequent blogger.
  
• It's riveting. Never for a moment does your mind wander from what's happening on screen. That was true in spades for me and this film.
• It makes you cry. Well, in my case, that's not all that hard to do. But, this film moved me and touched me more deeply than any in a long time. Perhaps, in part, because I could empathize so well with the last portion of the film. I won't give away the plot, but Eastwood nailed it!
• You forget the actors are actors. Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman and Hillary Swank are stars and magnificent actors. I forgot that right from the first reel. They became Frankie, Scrap, and Maggie.
  
• You can't imagine any other actors playing the major roles. I defy anyone who has seen this film to suggest any actors who could have done as well as Eastwood, Freeman, and Swank.
• It deals with strong human emotions and hard questions. "Million Dollar Baby" scores a 'knockout' here:
  
• What makes a life worth living?
• Is self-fulfillment enough?
• Striving vs attainment
• Personal relationships vs. success
• Love
• Guilt
  
• and many more
• It feels real (sorry no pun intended here either). And, boy does this film feel real, reagrdless if we're in the boxing gym, boxing ring, a restaurant, or Maggie's mother's trailer.
  
• It makes you laugh.

Was "Million dollar Baby" a perfect movie, without any flaws? Of course not. For example, it leaves you wondering about the problem between Frankie and his daughter. But, it comes pretty damn close to perfection in my book.

If anyone actually reads this, please comment! What great film characteristics did I leave out? Which would you delete?

From Kaballah to Jesus

What a wild and fantastically interesting day today was. This morning's Kaballah class discussed feminine aspect of God (Shekinha)and the role of sex in the unification (it's a long Kaballah story) of God. Tonight's class on Jewish history focused on the time period of the essential Christian story - Jesus's birth , preaching, miracles, death and resurrection. He certainly crammed a lot into a short life. Incidentally the early Christian views on sex sure differed from the Kabbalists'. With the early Christians, if you wanted to be celibate that was ok - after all, wasn't Jesus going to return pretty soon anyway and then the whole world would change? Good thing for them that they figured out that would be a hard sell. In contrast, the Kabbalists saw the sexual union between married man and woman as an important part of achieving God's reunification and "sexual" union between his masculine and feminine aspects. (I'm sold - where do I sign up?)

When Jesus lived is the time period in human history I find utterly and completely fascinating. If there was a time machine and I had a "ticket to ride", I would unhesitatingly pick this time period. Can you think of another time period which had a greater influence. on the the course of history? And, in which so much was going on?

I also keep thinking about this question: How would the course of human history have changed if Constantine had decided he really couldn't buy the Jesus story and instead really liked the Jewish one? And, so he declares Judaism as the official state religion of the Roman Empire in 313 C.E. Now what?

What would be different? What would be better? What worse? Would we have persecuted Christians as they persecuted us? Or, would we be more tolerant and let them live in peace? Would there have been a different kind of religious holocaust? Is it human nature to prey upon the minority? Would the world be a more peaceful place? Would Christianity have survived as Judaism has survived against incredible odds?

Of course, we'll never know. But, I think it's fascinating to contemplate and speculate. Someone should write a book!