Power of Idealism Month

Power of Idealism characters believe that life and love should involve a grand passion. They see the world in terms of sweeping epic poetry or as a struggle of operatic proportions.

Intensity of feeling (good or bad) makes this character’s life worth living. Power of Idealism characters feel it is better to be in pain than to be content or complacent.

These characters are willing to suffer for their art, their iconoclasm, or their noble or romantic gestures.
They believe that what is perfect but unavailable or unattainable is infinitely more desirable than what is flawed but possible or achievable.

“I would rather have thirty minutes of wonderful than a lifetime of nothing special.” Shelby Eatenton Latcherie (Julia Roberts) in Steel Magnolias

Throughout April, we will look at epic heroes, separated lovers and those coming of age. These are dramatic characters who are passionate, intense, and will never settle for anything less than perfection.

Separated Lovers

One of the three Power of Idealism kind or stories is are Separated Lovers- the romantics who are separated from one true love.

This character’s love is destined not to be joined in a lasting physical union on this mortal earth. Instead, theirs is a love that transcends time, distance, age, or death.

Nicholas Sparks is a pop culture master of this romance and tragedy form. His best-reviewed film, The Notebook, is a sweeping love story read from a faded notebook by a man to a woman in a nursing home, The story follows the lives of two North Carolina teens from very different worlds who spend a magical summer together before they are separated, first by her parents, and then by WWII.

Other classic examples are:

Romeo + Juliet (Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes) is the quintessential story of star-crossed romance. The teenaged lovers from warring families take their own lives to be together in death.

Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) in Casablanca. Rick, send his lover away to continue their separate roles
in the resistance movement during the most desperate days of World War II.

Karen Blixen (Meryl Streep) in Out of Africa, sends her lover away in order not to trap or cage his wild and free spirit.

Zhivago (Omar Sharif) in Doctor Zhivago, sends his lover away in order to save her life and the life of her child.

In each case,  love is transcendent because it will always live in their hearts— neither time, distance, or death will diminish it.

A darker take on ill-fated romance is Mickey and Mallory Knox (Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis) in Natural Born Killers.

Mickey and Mallory rebel against what they believe is a morally bankrupt society and the rapacious celebrity-crazed media which created them (and which they taunt and scorn). As the pair continue their killing spree, they always leave one witness to “tell the tale” of Mickey and Mallory Knox to the rest of the world. They know they only have a future together in legend and death.

Get the Power of Idealism eBook HERE.

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Sacrifice is a word that has very much fallen out of favor in our current cultural and political climate. Protect yourself.  Protect your career. Protect your party. Shut and go along to get along.  Don’t sacrifice anything for the good of the country or anyone else.

I’m sorry but, to me, this attitude is exemplified by Scott Rosenberg’s recent Facebook post which has been lauded for its “bravery” “courage” and excellent writing.  I have to call Bullshit.

I will admit, Rosenberg is right in calling out the sanctimonious “shock” of those who now condemn Harvey Weinstein, pretending personal ignorance.  These folks remind me of the gambling scene in Casablanca:

Rosenberg very rightly says:

And to me, if Harvey’s behavior is the most reprehensible thing one can imagine, a not-so-distant second is the current flood of sanctimonious denial and condemnation that now crashes upon these shores of rectitude in gloppy tides of bullshit righteousness.

Because everybody-fucking-knew.

And do you know how I am sure this is true?
Because I was there.
And I saw you.
And I talked about it with you.
You, the big producers; you, the big directors; you, the big agents; you, the big financiers.
And you, the big rival studio chiefs; you, the big actors; you, the big actresses; you, the big models.
You, the big journalists; you, the big screenwriters; you, the big rock stars; you, the big restaurateurs; you, the big politicians.

I saw you.
All of you.
God help me, I was there with you.

He repeats “Everybody fucking knew” several times.  Which begins to feel like an excuse.  It doesn’t matter what anybody else knew.  It matters what YOU fucking knew.  It matters what YOU did or didn’t do.

That’s the cowardly rub.  Rosenberg was enjoying himself too much, lapping up the perks, the prestige, and the champagne to do anything. It was benefiting his career too greatly, in becoming anointed as a major talent, to rock the boat. The fact is: HE saw it.  HE knew it.  HE did nothing.

But…
And this is as pathetic as it is true:
What would you have had us do?
Who were we to tell?
The authorities?
What authorities?
The press?
Harvey owned the press.
The Internet?
There was no Internet or reasonable facsimile thereof.
Should we have called the police?
And said what?
Should we have reached out to some fantasy Attorney General Of Movieland?
That didn’t exist.

Substitute 1930’s Germany and Rosenberg’s quote tells us exactly how the horrors of that time happened.  The excuse: “what could I do?” “who could I go and tell?” is a collaborating coward’s way out.  The Edmund Burke quote:  “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing”–  That’s what this is about.

I am not saying I’ve never been a coward when I should have spoken up.  I remember a particularly vicious writer’s room where the target was male.  I am just so annoyed by the acclaim Rosenberg’s post has gotten now when it now costs him nothing to speak out. His recent “mea culpa”, in fact, has only enhanced his reputation.  It seems like it was designed to do so.

I don’t doubt Scott Rosenberg is a good man (although I don’t know him personally) who did nothing.  He wasn’t willing to sacrifice anything to call out what was wrong.  And he even dances around blaming the victims:

Not to mention, most of the victims chose not to speak out.

Like it was a choice?  Rosenberg seems to think he needn’t speak out, which WAS a choice because the women Weinstein destroyed didn’t want to risk total professional and emotional annihilation?

Contrast this with Quentin Tarantino’s interview reported in the UK Independent:

Quentin Tarantino has admitted he was aware, for decades, about Harvey Weinstein’s alleged misconduct towards women. The director said he failed to act in order to protect women despite knowing about several instances of alleged sexual assault, stating: “I knew enough to do more than I did.”

In a new interview Tarantino, who worked with Weinstein on some of his best known films including Pulp Fiction, said he regretted not taking action with the knowledge he had.

“There was more to it than just the normal rumours, the normal gossip,” he told the New York Times. “It wasn’t second hand. I knew he did a couple of these things. “I wish I had taken responsibility for what I heard. If I had done the work I should have done then, I would not have had to work with him.” 

What a wonderful ride Scott Rosenberg had at the expense of so much suffering.  He waxes poetic about just how much fun it was.  And I can guarantee that Oscar-winning Quentin Tarantino had an even better ride.  But Tarantino doesn’t get into the perks, the glam, the fun!  His was a simple apology for HIS actions and failings.

I am glad Rosenberg is ashamed.  He should be.  But what is he going to do now– besides public handwringing and excuse making, which has served to garner him much public adoration?  What is he willing to sacrifice now?  What is Tarantino going to sacrifice?

Would the WGA (Writers Guild) ever bring gender equality and an end to sexual harassment to the bargaining table?  Would it ever strike because of those unmet demands?  Or is it just the privileged white male’s income protection society?

The film Volver begins with a wonderful scene in which all the women of a small rural village scrub the tombstones of their dead. An unrelenting wind blows and threatens to overwhelm their efforts. But the women persist. What a stunning visual metaphor for the performance of the mundane tasks of life in the face of overwhelming grief.

We are told that these winds also fan fires that burn out of control in the village. Raimunda and Sole’s mother and father were consumed in such a fire. This is another powerful metaphor for rage and grief, the core of which is revealed in a stunning confession toward the end of the film.

After Raimunda (Penélope Cruz) and Sole (Lola Dueñas) clean their parent’s tomb along with Rainmunda’s teenage daughter, Paula (Yohana Cobo). The women then visit Aunt Paula (Chus Lampreave) and we learn Raimunda was estranged from her mother and Aunt Paula raised her.

Aunt Paula is nearly blind, mentally confused and forgetful. It’s a miracle she can still manage on her own. The old woman insists that she doesn’t. The girls’ dead mother, Irene (Carmen Maura) helps her out. When Aunt Paula dies, circumstances dictate that Sole attends the funeral alone. She returns with the ghost of their mother, Irene, in the trunk of her car.

Volver is a powerful story about how loss and grief are, at last, resolved. This is a very specific process that is present in every layer of laughter, horror, sadness and love in the film. It opens the path to forgiveness for Rainmunda and her mother.

We learn that Rainmunda’s father was a philanderer and a sexual predator. He sexually abused Rainmunda when she was a teenager. Rainmunda got pregnant and had her daughter, Paula, as a result. Rainmunda has kept this a secret all these years.

Rainmunda could never forgive her mother for not knowing what was happening and not protecting her. She turned her back on her mother and refused to have anything to do with her. In order to resolve her anger, grief and loss Rainmunda must revisit the past to:

1. See the situation as a whole

2. See her relative place in the situation

3. Speak the unspoken emotional communication

4. Cherish the positive

5. Let go of the rest

This process is key to resolving any loss and is outlined in great detail in The Grief Recovery Handbook by John W. James and Russell Friedman. It is an approach that is vital to any story about finding the courage to forgive.

Let’s look at how these steps are applied in Volver:

1. See the situation as a whole. As the film opens, Rainmunda is an overburdened and overworked mother, just as perhaps her own mother was. In a repetition of the past, her own husband drunkenly attacks Rainmunda’s daughter sexually. Rainmunda has no idea this sexual attack is coming; she could not prevent it and she could not stop it.

In a stunning confession later in the film, Irene admits that she discovered Rainmunda’s abuse by Raimunda’s father/Irene’s husband. Irene killed her husband and set the building on fire. Her husband was with another woman and everyone assumed that the woman’s body was Irene’s. Irene was forced to become a “ghost,” hiding in Aunt Paula’s large rambling home and caring for the woman who took care of her daughter.

Raimunda now sees the whole situation. Her mother loved her and was as fierce on her behalf as Rainmunda was on her daughter’s behalf.

2. See your relative place in the situation. Rainmunda couldn’t possibly understand her mother until faced with the horror of such a situation herself. Irene could not forgive herself until she saw how powerless her daughter was to prevent the same situation. Rainmunda and Irene now see one another in each other’s eyes. Each woman sees her relative place in the situation by seeing the relative place of the other.

3. Speak the unspoken emotional communication. The unspoken communication is, of course: “I love you. I have always loved you.” As mother and daughter begin to understand each other, they rediscover the deep bonds of love and sacrifice that connect them. The power of love and the powerlessness of love bind them together. Their hearts open and they forgive each other.

4. Cherish the positive. Rainmunda has a wonderful moment of cherishing the positive in a very funny scene about her mother’s farts. This is a stellar example of Almodovar’s quirky unsentimental portrait of these women. It is the kind of little memory that makes us love and cherish each other in all our weakness and human frailty.

5. Let go of the rest. When Augustina, their Aunt Paula’s long-time neighbor, becomes ill with cancer the women return again to the village. Irene slips into Augustina’s house and is greeted as a welcome ghost by Augustina, who is near death herself. Another grief in the story is about to be resolved.

The body that was found in the burned building was Augustina’s mother. Irene will be able to reassure Augustina that her mother didn’t disappear on a whim to leave her alone and unloved. Irene takes charge of Augustina’s care and slips back into her purgatory world as a ghost. Her daughters let Irene go to do her penance with a quiet and simple grace.

The movie’s title song, a tango made famous by Carlos Gardel is sung by Rainmunda (Cruz), Estrella Morente provides the dubbed vocals.

I am afraid of the encounter
with the past that returns
to confront my life.
I am afraid of the nights
that, filled with memories,
shackle my dreams.
But the traveler that flees
sooner or later stops his walking.
And although forgetfulness, which destroys all,
has killed my old dream,
I keep concealed a humble hope
that is my heart’s whole fortune.

www.planet-tango.com/lyrics/volver.htm
Lyrics translated by Walter Kane

Volver is a profoundly hopeful film, despite being filled with rape, murder, incest and death. The hope that is the heart’s whole fortune is the generosity that allows human beings to forgive. Forgiveness is our amazing power to reject the poison of the past, redeem our lives and reconstruct our bond with those whom we love. (For it is those we love who have the power to hurt us the most deeply.)

This same process is also at work in Casablanca, another powerful film about resolving anger, grief and loss. When Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) walks back into Rick Blaine’s life (Humphrey Bogart), Rick goes through the same five step process to resolve his anger, grief and loss.

1. Rick must see the situation as a whole. Rick learns Ilsa had to send him away to save him from the Nazis. She had to keep her marriage to Victor Laszlo secret to protect him and others in the resistance. She had to go to Victor (Paul Henreid), who was deathly ill outside of Paris.

2. Rick must see his relative place in the situation. Victor was the hope of the whole resistance movement. The resistance would die if Ilsa didn’t go to Victor and save him. Ilsa made the only choice she could possibly make under the circumstances.

3. Rick and Ilsa speak the crucial unsaid emotional communication. They love each other, they have always loved each other and their hearts will always belong to each other. Ilsa says: “I said I would never leave you.” Rick replies: “And you never will.”

4. Rick and Ilsa are able to cherish the positive: Rick says: “We’ll always have Paris. We didn’t have it, we’d lost it until you came to Casablanca. We got it back last night.” By truly cherishing that time together they have rekindled and reclaimed their love for each other.

5. Rick is able to let go of the rest: Rick says: “The problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.” He sends Ilsa away just as she sent him away. Rick says: “If you don’t go with him, you’ll regret it. Maybe not today, but soon, and for the rest of your life.” “Where I’m going you can’t follow. What I’m going to do you can’t be any part of.”

Like Volver, Casablanca puts Rick in Ilsa’s situation. He now fully understands her choice. He validates Ilsa’s choice by making the same choice she did. Rick sends Ilsa away with Victor because Victor’s work in the resistance cannot continue without her.

Although they are not physically together Rick and Ilsa will live forever in each others’ hearts. Their grief and loss are resolved and they are both free to go on with their work and their lives.

Here’s how to implement these steps in your film:

1. See the situation as a whole. Have your character learn, discover or expose something that fills in a crucial missing piece in the story. Your character has made some assumption that was false, incomplete, misguided or ignorant. His or her bitterness and/or anger is built on an assumption that isn’t the whole truth. He or she doesn’t fully understand what was in the other person’s heart or what the full circumstances were. A revelation, discovery or realization fills in the gap.

2. See your relative place in the situation. Your character’s bitterness, anger, loss or grief stems from a single-minded and narrow personal perspective. His or her feelings or situation were just a part of what was going on at the time. Instead of seeing things just from a personal perspective, force your character to see the broader canvas. Put your character in the other person’s situation or position. Make that person’s choice more understandable by forcing your character to make a similar kind of choice. Force your character to “walk awhile in the other person’s shoes.”

3. Speak the unsaid emotional communication. This is some form of: “I love you. I have always loved you.” Those we love have the power to hurt us most deeply. Remembering and reclaiming that love is crucial to forgiveness. Please note: This communication is not “You have hurt me deeply.” It is a positive affirmation of the other person and how deeply the character feels about him or her.

4. Cherish the positive. There is a reason nearly everyone in the world knows the line: “We’ll always have Paris.” It’s because Rick’s line speaks to the power of positive memories. No one can take those transcendent moments from us. They remind us of all that was good, true, funny and/or wonderful about a person or time we loved. Force your character to embrace and cherish what was positive about the person or situation.

5. Let go of the rest. Forgiveness is not an emotion. It is an action. Forgiveness is letting go of the hurt, bitterness and/or disappointment of the past. Forgiveness demands that we let go of that which we cannot change. It requires us to be generous with ourselves and let go of the destructive bonds that bind and imprison us. Force your character to let go of bitterness and anger. Give your character an action that offers the gift of generosity.

I often ask my students to think of someone they love who has hurt them deeply. I ask them to think about how hard it would be to take each of those five steps themselves. Then I ask them to make that process equally as hard for their characters. When you force your character to confront and resolve loss you give an amazing gift of generosity to your audience. Volver gives that gift now. Casablanca has given that gift for decades. It is your turn next.

Melissa Rosenberg, one of the most successful female writers in the business, has a new fantasy assignment.  I’m looking forward to seeing how she revives a venerable old franchise.  I am a bigger fan of her work on Dexter than on Twilight, so I am curious what she does here.

After taking on vampires in Summit’s Twilight Saga, writer Melissa Rosenberg is tackling a different kind of immortal being: Scottish highlanders.

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The scribe is in negotiations to come on board to work on the studio’s remake of Highlander. Neal Moritz is producing the project, which offers an update on the 1986 movie starring Christopher Lambert, Sean Connery and Clancy Brown. Justin Lin (Fast Five) is attached to direct. Peter Davis is also producing.

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The original story centered on a Scottish swordsman, who discovers he is part of a secret race of near-immortal beings and faces off against an unstoppable barbarian who covets the power gained from there being only one of their kind left….

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(A)s the sole writer on Summit’s vampire pentalogy, she has proved adept at handling both character and action, as well as yearning, a key component of Highlander as protagonist Connor MacLeod watches his true love age while he does not. Before tackling Twilight, Rosenberg was a writer/co-executive producer on Dexter, the Showtime series that darkly balances family with bloody carnage.

Read the full story here:  http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/blogs/heat-vision/twilight-writer-melissa-rosenberg-takes-97481

Humiliation Scenes

THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY: The scene starts with Ted Stroehmann (Ben Stiller) gazing out a bathroom window, it appears he is window peeping, he panics and then his zipper gets embarrassingly (and painfully) stuck.

MY BEST FRIEND’S WEDDING: The scene starts with Julianne Potter (Julia Roberts) stirring up trouble by taking Michael O’Neal (Dermot Mulroney) and fiancee Kimberly Wallace (Cameron Diaz) for a drink at a Karaoke Bar. Kimmy is pressed into singing possibly the worst Karaoke debut in history. She completely “owns” it and turns everyone’s groans into cheers. This is also a great example of a comedic turnaround.

BRIDGET JONES: The scene starts with Bridget (Renee Zellwegger) showing up at a party in an embarrassingly tight Bunny costume scene. No one else is wearing a costume. She was never told the party plan was changed.

Rejection Scenes

TOOTSIE: The scene starts with a montage of Michael Dorsey’s (Dustin Hoffman) audition scenes. He is told he is too short, too tall, too young, too old etc.

JERRY MACGUIRE: The scene starts as Jerry (Tom Cruise) is frantically watching the lights blinking out on his phone as all his old clients hang up and avoid him.

WITNESS: The scene starts as Det. Capt. John Brook (Harrison Ford) stumbles on Rachel Lapp (Kelly McGillis) bathing in her room. She drops her towel and he turns away. The next scene finds him in agony in his room.

Unfairness Scenes

ET: The scene starts with Elliot (Henry Thomas) spotting the strange creature E.T. No one believes him and his brother makes fun of him.

TITANIC: Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio) is framed for stealing a jewel. He protests his innocence. No one believes him except Rose DeWitt Bukater (Kate Winslet) He is taken away in handcuffs.

HOME ALONE: The scene starts with Kevin McCallister (Macaulay Culkin) fighting with his brother. He is blamed for creating a mess, despite his protests, he is sent to his room.

WIZARD OF OZ: The scene starts with Mrs. Gulch (Margaret Hamilton) reporting Toto attacked her cat. Despite Dorothy’s (Judy Garland) protests Toto is taken away.

Abandonment Scenes

CASABLANCA: The scene starts as Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) is waiting for Ilsa. He gets a goodbye note from her and is left at the station to board the train without her.

ET: The scene starts as the Mother Ship leaves and ET is left behind.