Fourteen two

 Meet Joe Black has so much good in it that it floods over you when you try to think of it. Yes, I know it's schmaltzy but I love schmaltzy. I have always believed in the lightning strike. I have always believed in "you were there; you were the guy" and it's all I've ever wanted to be there and be the guy, even if that is an impossible dream.

I adore when Quince, who is borderline pathetic but finds his balls, courtesy of Joe, to rise to the occasion magnificently, tells Mr Black that Alison knows the worst thing about him and he about her and that means they can love each other without restraint, and yes, I believe in that too.

I knew the worst thing about my Alison and yes, I would have loved her even despite that but she has no capacity to be loved. It's so much worse than being incapable of love, or even just being really bad at it. My dad is really bad at it to the point you wonder if he ever has been capable of love. Not infatuation. He can do that. He is and always has been infatuated with one of my sisters, just like Bill in the film. And poor Alison, who is almost a comic figure trying to put together a party to show her love for him while he just cannot be arsed with it and despite being portrayed as loveable, just not being good enough at loving her back even to pretend to care, well, she is a story about what is just enough for you if you cannot get the real love you yearn for.

There are plenty of wrong notes, mostly stemming from Brad Pitt's mannered "acting", which sometimes really works and sometimes, well, just doesn't. But I think you forgive him because of his incandescent chemistry with Claire Forlani, who is magnificent, even if he does get acted into a tiny ball by Anthony Hopkins, who doesn't steal every scene so much as caress it out of the room and off to a quiet place with him. The wrongest note may well be at the end, where Joe's sacrifice ends with letting Susan have what she should have? could have? will come to want? It's just awkward and weird, and you have to wonder whether she really would just go with it. Anyway, films are not after all real life so of course she does, and if you are a lady, I don't need to ask you if you would because you would. He's the guy and there he is.

So of course this is how I spent my Valentine's night. I have no Valentine but I have not entirely given up on ever having one again. I think that I have spent so many years just with what is enough, or even what is nowhere near enough, that I'm not sure I always mind so much. I am just sorry to have been that person for other people. For some, just enough is enough. It always has been and always will be. Meet Joe Black will never be the film for them. But for me, it is. It is the film for me, the dream of the gauche boy, overfamiliar with loneliness and pain, who wants the love with no restraints, off the edge of the cliff and no regrets.

posted by Dr Zen @ 11:42 pm 0 comments