Akinlabi Omo-Oso

"You used me so you could get out of LA, and then you blamed me for it!" screams Charlie at Nicole; this statement underscoring the danger of deriving life's essence from another, the unfairness of placing such burden on these ones, all the more so when our expectations aren't met or we evolve and our needs change. In another scene, as Nicole gave a summary of her marriage to Nora, her lawyer, she said: "that's when I realised he truly didn't see me. He didn't see me as something separate from himself," continuing a vein of thought that shows how a relationship once established on a precedence of dependence and an uneven balance of power, becomes almost impossible to correct. They become set in their ways, especially the dominant spouse, and unable to comprehend a reason for change, become resentful of it. One feels gaslighted, the other, railroaded. Scarlett Johansson was captivating in the movie as her emotional spectrum from unhappy woman to stricken lover to fledgling independent woman, whose silent cries and lone tears - sometimes in the space of a scene - helps illuminate the complex nature of divorce; it isn't necessarily as simple as not loving your spouse anymore or because you cannot forgive and move past their errors, that sometimes it's because they are unwilling or incapable of making changes into being the persons that we now need. It was also quite an education into the viciousness and mercantile nature of divorce in contemporary America, where truth is contrived, law is exploited, and winning depends on how much you are willing to pay to recruit your own a***hole.

The movie is a rich smorgasbord of existential themes: the futility of excess, the cold loneliness of death, and the impossible task of parenting. Russ Bufallino, Tony Salerno, Tony Provezano, Sally Bugs, Frank Sheeran - mob bosses and underlings - who ordered and carried out hits on others were just as helpless when death came knocking; that their wealth - the protection of it, and which they killed for - was especially meaningless when it ought to have mattered the most shows the futility of anything more than the essential. It's good to have these extras, but their importance can't be anymore superficial. Frank's relationship with his daughters, especially Peggy, shows just how dicey parenting can be, that the best possible choices may not necessarily give the best result, and that a sheltered upbringing is more of a handicap than a positive in helping children truly understand the world. Peggy for instance, idolised Jimmy Hoffa because she only saw the persona and not the entire man, naively using him as a standard to measure her father - the one she thought she saw clearly and knew only too well. Jimmy Hoffa may not have painted houses, but he sure wasn't averse to the idea when it suited him and when it meant others had to do his dirty job. How skewed Peggy's vision was! The Irishman offers a quick learning in the way of the world - loyalty is reserved only for that person who has the most direct influence on your own existence, and Frank Sheeran was no dolt in this regard. NB: If ever the link between the mob and JFK's assassination was dismissed as a load of hot air, this movie has succeeded in raising this age-old question, teasing us thereby with the possibility of such a connection.

The movie brings to our consciousness this salient fact that society is a reflection of parenting; that there are no bad children, only bad parents. Such instances as when Mother mentioned to Daughter that if her assessment score fails to meet the projected expectation from the previous year, it would be a failure of her role as a mother and not the daughter's; this sentiment also to be found in Mother's reply that "mothers need time to learn" when Daughter asked why she didn't have any siblings as yet. It offers this radical proposition that human society can be re-created if existing fault lines along race, culture, religion and other perceived differences are first destroyed; providing such suitable analogies as the impermeability of the pod from corruptive external influences, and Mother's comment to Daughter to choose a sibling out of any of thousands of embryos as "there isn't a wrong choice," eliminating as it were, societally-imposed limitations and differentiation. It proposes that perhaps, the greatest things that make us human aren't entirely exclusive, that they can be codified and taught to all humans successfully. That the very qualities of being humane, ethical, and moral can be learnt and imbibed; that they are not genetic nor intrinsic, and the degree to which they are expressed and successfully passed down through generations is a measure of human civilisation and advancement.

The movie is something of a dramatic irony that highlights the unconscionable practices of big business and the hypocrisy of consumers. It is less about activism for global vegetarianism and more about how we treat one another as well as animals (even when we plan to eat them for food). We see this balanced theme in the use of fish and chicken as food by Mija and her grandfather, just as we saw the cautionary tale in taking these causes to the extreme, as when Silver (a member of the Animal Liberation Front) swooned from inanition, a result of his refusal to eat even the smallest tomato because of his belief that all forms of food production are exploitative. The hypocrisy of consumers who complain about animal treatment and welfare, about child labour and sweat shops, but who still demand (and bargain hunt) for cheaper prices was exquisitely represented in Nancy Mirando's remark that, "if it's cheap, they will buy it." A damning verdict on where the true loyalties of customers lie - Their pocket? Or effecting real change? You can't have both. You can't demand for cheaper prices and not ask how businesses will support such price points! Mija gave up her golden pig to redeem Okja, whom she considered family. Keep in mind that in Korean society, a golden pig is gifted to a girl of marrigeable age as a dowry, and was thus, a steep price paid to ransom her friend, just as the gimlet-eyed Nancy acknowledged that "this thing is worth a lot of money." The corollary is this: How much are you willing to pay for the change you claim to desire? How willing are you to put your money where your mouth is? If you truly desire reform of big business, what advantages are you willing to let go to see that happen?

Passengers, quite simply, shows us the difference between humans and robots. While the latter may lay claim to cognitive intelligence, they fall short and come nowhere close to our capacity for morality, empathy, love and the entire gamut of human emotions - some of our finest and worst qualities as humans; especially as regards decision making, which often have several different complicated layers other than the logical. When Jim contemplates waking Aurora prematurely, it was borne of a selfish need for companionship, but which to Arthur, the android bartender, seemed only logical - a fitting solution to a pressing problem without the unnecessary handicap called morality. Again, when Aurora falsely declares that there aren't any secrets between Jim and her, Arthur sees fit to correct that impression, not for the sake of right or wrong, but because of how illogical the claim was. He's indifferent to how either feels. He is incapable of comprehending them, seeing events only through the narrow lens of logic. Whereas Gus, a human, could empathise with both of them - Jim, for the years of isolation he would have had to endure due to no fault of his, and Aurora, for her righteous anger at the one who decided her future without her consent. The movie portrays in stark tones this messy business called humanity, all its strong points and imperfections. It doesn’t always make sense nor is it perfect despite the best intentions (Avalon's malfunction paints a ready picture). And perhaps, therein lies the answer - it's not meant to make sense nor be perfect, we are just to do our part, our share of good (hopefully not bad!) and move on.

The movie questions our linear concept of time, this business of starting from the beginning and stopping at the end. But what if time could be bent, shaped, moulded, to fit our purpose? If we could make choices about the present from the future and feel the impact of future choices in the present? This amorphous, flexible nature of time. Hence, in keeping with this theme, the movie doesn't have a strictly linear sequence of events - all are beautifully and complexly juxtaposed, one on the other. Recognising this requires paying careful attention, as when Louise says to Ian, "I just realised why my husband left me," even though she was speaking to the one who would become that husband; or while in a trance from the future told her daughter (who was yet unborn) that "her father left because she told him what he wasn't ready to hear"; or when Louise averts a global war due to insights she gained from the future with her now fully-formed ability for time-bending, and many such scenarios peppered throughout this captivating movie. She doesn't always have the answers even in the future and many times has to fill these blank spaces with updated knowledge from the present; such instances as the identity of her husband, providing her daughter with the answer to a Science question, and how she came about the ability to gain insights from the future. The future gains from the present just as equally as the present profits from the future. It isn't one way, linear; it's cyclical. Then the denouement, when Louise asks Ian, if knowing how his life will play out, he would change anything. The zinger of a question that makes us consider the security that our linear universe provides - the protection that comes from not knowing, free from the nerve-wracking pressure of deciding present and future fates.

I believe this movie portrays that real artists-the legendary ones-are borderline crazy, wracked by insecurities or an ego, and are rushed headlong towards the absurd (according to conventional standards) by a mania that goads them on - the quest for a truth that is worth the highest stake. It always consumes them. But from all that craziness, from all that cascade of raw, overpowering, conflicting emotions come the breakthrough, the masterpiece, the ultimate answer. It is just as Albert Camus observed: that real knowledge about a thing comes from following the logic of it to its bitter end, not abdicating this course even when it gets difficult. It is very demanding and the cost exorbitantly high, reason few have ever ventured to these distant regions. But Riggan Thomson did, and he found his answer(?)

The shock and fright on their deceptively innocent faces as it dawned on them that the show us up. Hands reaching for their guns for one last go, but not before a posse of men appeared from behind the trees, weapons poised. Then... The cracking sound of multiple gunfire; Bonnie and Clyde's recoiling bodies as the unrelenting bullets speared through them; blood-spattered upholstery; spider-web crack on the windshield; bullet-ridden car; and finally, the crumpled, spent bodies of America's Most Wanted, dying the way they had lived - gruesomely. The crescendo - as the movie for ninety minutes steadily builds up to this scene. The suddenness of the action, not even the rapid gunfire, is what shocks you. The outpouring of public grief at their death is what surprises you. The pensiveness and show of dignity by Hamer and Gault for the dead, irrespective of, is what gives you pause.

I have watched this awesome movie four times! The characters have become like old friends, thanks to the fantastic crew and the stellar actors. Interspersed as it is with meaningful quotes, which in their simplicity, leave you thinking about their inherent common sense and aptness, as when Alan Turing said, "sometimes we can't do what feels good; we have to do what is logical." This, after they had broken the Enigma Code and successfully mapped the location of all British warships, convoys, and German U-boats in the North Atlantic told his team members that they couldn't just go on a saving spree lest the Germans got wind of their breakthrough, change the settings of the Enigma machine, and bring about three years of hard work to nothing. Or Joan's advice to Alan on the importance of interpersonal relationships when she said "if you really want to solve your puzzle, then you are going to need all the help you can get, and they (his team members) are not going to help you if they do not like you", and how Alan made a little more effort after this. But based on what we now know today, he may have been on the Autism spectrum seeing as he found it difficult to understand nuanced speech and interactions, comparing conversations, as he once did, to ciphers; thus lacking the basic skills needed for social connections (and which sadly hurt him a lot because he was misunderstood). The movie is also peppered with quite a handful of insights, like how our brains work differently hence, making us have different preferences and tastes; how we never really know the hardwork that goes on behind the scenes of many successful ventures, the players of which never get to be celebrated; why an unflinching belief in ourselves and our vision even when others do not may be the lynchpin that persuades them to our point of view; also how "sometimes it is the very people who no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine" and why we must by neccessity, tolerate and treat with consideration those we deem different from us.

The movie takes on the contentious issues of habitat degradation and trophy hunting with a couple of strong, poignant scenes. In the beginning, you see pockets of trees and lush greenery gradually give way to human settlements, as well as the collision course between Man and beast when they are forced into close proximity. One could argue that Shere Khan is a villain created by Man's relentless encroachment. And towards the end, the heartbreaking scene where Mowgli comes upon the head of jolly friend and fellow outlier, Bhoot, among Captain Lockwood's trophy collection - a moment of epiphany for the boy who, only a few scenes back, had considered kinship with mankind. The characters are well fleshed and multi-dimensional: the motherly, fierce and proactive Neesha; the jolly but exacting instructor, Baalu; the sensitive but ferocious Bhageera with a scarred past; the wise and proud leader of the wolf pack, Akeelah; and the sheer depredatory evil that is Shere Khan. If you call it a coming-of-age movie, you wouldn't be too mistaken, for through several knocks, falls, bruises, scrapes and banishment, Mowgli grows into the half man - half wolf (yet, neither both) who becomes their leader. The runt of the pack who makes several fearless moves to protect his own and bring about justice - for those of mankind (his mother inclusive) killed by Khan, and those of the animal world needlessly killed and maimed by Lockwood and what he represented - just as Akeelah had prophesied. And in this prophecy lies the covert message that the survival of the animals and the jungle will depend on the man-cub (animal lingo for a more animal-loving, younger human generation).