In the beginning, God created skies and earth.
Welcome back. Happy Lord’s Day to all you fellow God-people who might be reading this today. To those of you who do not number yourself among Christians, I say, “Happy Sunday.”
I remember reading Forrest Gump by Winston Groom. Truly, it was the funniest book I ever read in my life. I stopped carrying it with me to restaurants because it made me laugh out loud, and that can be embarrassing, as well as dangerous, especially if you start choking on an olive.
I've read the book once. I've seen the movie scores of times. I love that movie. I've shown the movie to students in English and History classes. I would love to teach the book in an American lit course.
The movie is funny, but the book is funnier. The movie is an interpretation of the book. It is another writer’s, or group of writers’, interpretation of a single text. It is a different medium too. As such, it has been transformed into a nearly different story from the one in the book. Certainly, Forrest has been transformed into a different person.
I've read the book once. I've seen the movie scores of times. I love that movie. I've shown the movie to students in English and History classes. I would love to teach the book in an American lit course.
The movie is funny, but the book is funnier. The movie is an interpretation of the book. It is another writer’s, or group of writers’, interpretation of a single text. It is a different medium too. As such, it has been transformed into a nearly different story from the one in the book. Certainly, Forrest has been transformed into a different person.
Tom Hanks just wins your heart with his Academy Award winning performance. He gives a human face to what many would have us believe is the "true" Southern man: simple, with a simple trust in life. I'm hearing Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Simple Kind of Man" lyrics in my head right about now. I tend to substitute "simpleton" for "simple" since often that is how the virtue of simplicity has been incarnated these days.
Sally Field as Mrs. Gump, who sure does want his son to get his education, is more complex than Forrest. Robin Penn Wright is Jenny. She is more complex still. She becomes lost, but is found again once she reconnects with her best friend whom she loves and by whom she can finally give herself permission to be loved. We see her complexity transform so she eventually finds happiness in the simplicity of her life with Forrest.
Gary Sinese plays another lost soul who must deal with a transformation in his life. He goes from the simplicity of following orders and giving commands in the military to living his life without legs. This makes him furious at God, but he makes his peace with God and becomes a simple, happy man.
Sally Field as Mrs. Gump, who sure does want his son to get his education, is more complex than Forrest. Robin Penn Wright is Jenny. She is more complex still. She becomes lost, but is found again once she reconnects with her best friend whom she loves and by whom she can finally give herself permission to be loved. We see her complexity transform so she eventually finds happiness in the simplicity of her life with Forrest.
Gary Sinese plays another lost soul who must deal with a transformation in his life. He goes from the simplicity of following orders and giving commands in the military to living his life without legs. This makes him furious at God, but he makes his peace with God and becomes a simple, happy man.
Those four characters tug, pluck, tug, strum, and yank on my heart strings every time I watch that movie, but they barely resemble the characters in the book.
I love that opening scene on the Savannah park bench. It reveals the first intimation that Forrest is the kind of man who accepts everybody. Throughout the movie he did not notice if someone was black or white or in a wheel chair or holding guns at a Black Panther rally. If he had to pee, he’d just as soon tell a president as a friend. On the sea of humanity, he bobbed however that ocean moved him. Indeed, in the movie, people were just people to him.
He had a very simple faith in God. A hating God never seemed to have occurred to him. The complexity Gump experienced in life was the binary question of freedom or fate. Do we make our destiny or does fate make us who we are? In the end, he decided it was both.
When I’m feeling that lackluster sense that life can impose upon my mood, I simply have to watch Forrest break the shackles of his metal braces on his magic legs. The symbolism is most obvious.
I cried when I watched Forrest Gump the first time. I usually cry in the same place whenever I watch it again and again. It's hard as a Big Orange fan from the University of Tennessee to watch him return those kickoffs back for touchdowns for the Crimson Tide. Each time I weep like a baby being fed Gerber jar lids.
Seriously, the scene where his best friend, Bubba Blue, played by Mykelti Williamson, dies on a share in Vietnam is very emotional. Another emotional scence occurs when Lieutenant Dan “makes his peace with God." Two other tear jerking scences occur with the passing of Forrest's mother and his wife’s death after she succumbs to AIDS.
He had a very simple faith in God. A hating God never seemed to have occurred to him. The complexity Gump experienced in life was the binary question of freedom or fate. Do we make our destiny or does fate make us who we are? In the end, he decided it was both.
When I’m feeling that lackluster sense that life can impose upon my mood, I simply have to watch Forrest break the shackles of his metal braces on his magic legs. The symbolism is most obvious.
I cried when I watched Forrest Gump the first time. I usually cry in the same place whenever I watch it again and again. It's hard as a Big Orange fan from the University of Tennessee to watch him return those kickoffs back for touchdowns for the Crimson Tide. Each time I weep like a baby being fed Gerber jar lids.
Seriously, the scene where his best friend, Bubba Blue, played by Mykelti Williamson, dies on a share in Vietnam is very emotional. Another emotional scence occurs when Lieutenant Dan “makes his peace with God." Two other tear jerking scences occur with the passing of Forrest's mother and his wife’s death after she succumbs to AIDS.
The gentle way he relates to Little Forrest was also deeply moving.
Last year I met Winston Groom at a book signing. I heard him lecture and discovered, much to my surprise, that he loves to write history. I bought his book Kearney’s March and stood in line so he could sign it.
Last year I met Winston Groom at a book signing. I heard him lecture and discovered, much to my surprise, that he loves to write history. I bought his book Kearney’s March and stood in line so he could sign it.
Winston Groom is really tall. He looked nearly as tall sitting at the signing table. I asked him if it bothered him that the movie was so much different from his book.
He replied tersely, “I have no control over what they do to my book.”
He replied tersely, “I have no control over what they do to my book.”
Mr. Groom did not strike me as being enthusiastic about the movie.
Next time, I will write about the book and explain what this has to do with never leaving God.
Next time, I will write about the book and explain what this has to do with never leaving God.
I hope to see you here. Blessings…
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