epic

It can be tough to make up your mind how to spend an unspoken-for Sunday, and moreso if the weather is in some ambiguous state like "scattered thunderstorms". Such was our situation yesterday. To go to church or not? Not; we haven't been to our UU church in a couple of weeks, but it's summer and they're cool with that; there was long-overdue yardwork waiting. But to mow or not to mow? To mow indeed, though there were a couple of brief cloudbursts before I was done. But then what to do with the rainy (or maybe not) afternoon?

Ordinarily we'd head for the neighborhood pool, but weather radar showed forbidding-looking spots of red and dark green possibly headed our way, so we thought about a movie. The only thing currently in theaters that we'd even consider taking our kids to see is Epic, and reviews have been mixed. My wife sifted through some of these before finally alighting on one that was, very possibly, the most helpful movie review I have ever read: A delightful animated woodland fantasy for undemanding families. Ten minutes later we were in the car headed toward the theater.

The eight-year-old loved it. The four-year-old claims to have loved it, although it's not clear to what extent she was just imitating her sister; she was all smiles afterwards, but occupied Mommy's lap for a large part of the movie. My wife enjoyed it, for what it was-- she has never been such a big fantasy fan, though she tolerates it better than sci fi.

Me? Oh, I was merely moved to tears.

Maybe you've seen the movie. Maybe you're thinking What?! Did you watch the same movie I did? I mean, OK, it was good fun, but... little faerie people riding around on hummingbirds? This is for grown men to weep over?

I see your point, but see, you were watching a delightful animated woodland fantasy for undemanding families. I was getting a flogging.

Did you look at the backstory? The protagonist (an older-teen-aged girl) comes to live with her estranged father after her mother dies. Why wasn't she living with him before? Because he spent all his energy in pursuit of evidence for the existence of the little faerie people I just mentioned. Many years before he had inadvertently driven away the woman he loved (and with her his own daughter) because he insisted on the reality of something that everybody around him thought was impossible and insane.

I found the parallels with my own life (or rather, with my own worst fears) to be rather striking.

Yep: I could not help reading this animated kids' flick as a commentary on the nature of faith. Specifically, the sort of faith that tears up families. Luke 14 faith. Of course the faith I have in mind is not about miniature "leaf men" but the reality of the life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God. Every professing Christian knows that when you say these things out loud, with a straight face and no nod to "myth" and "metaphor", many people will back away or at least try to change the subject. Now imagine the person backing away is your spouse.

To sum up, it was actually a pretty good movie. Lots of fun action. Lots of profoundly beautiful visuals. But what sticks with me, in my doubt, in my silence, is a scene near the end when the daughter and father (now vindicated in his odd beliefs after years of loneliness following the loss of his family-- courage or selfish stupidity?) are looking at an old picture of the two of them with the mother. And the dad says, "I always thought... if I could just prove it to her..."

If I could just prove it to her.