Requiem for a Dream

I was a little hesitant to rent and watch Requiem for a Dream because of its very intense and depressing reputation. However, I am writing my final paper about drug addiction and felt that along with the film Trainspotting, Requiem for a Dream would be an excellent film to help broaden my knowledge on the subject and hopefully assist in some inspiration to write a better and more passionate paper. Well, I was right…and I am really glad that I rented the film.  Although Requiem for a Dream is a very sad film, I love how it is able to bring such a realistic aspect of drug addiction through this story as we observe the lives of four people crumble and face consequences they never even imagined.

The character I found most unlikely to suffer from an addiction is Sarah, an older woman that seems to be widowed. I could tell that Sarah is pretty lonely, which is understandable because she lives by herself and spends most of her time watching a game show on television. The game show is her source of excitement from day to day.

Sarah has a son named Harry, and she completely ignores the fact that Harry is a drug addict. We see how the lives of addicts also affect the people around them by Harry’s obviously repetitive stealing and selling of his own mother's belongings to a pawn shop in order to get money for drugs.  At the beginning of the film Harry steals a television, and Sarah merely walks down to the pawn shop and buys it back. She feels that Harry is the only thing she has left and basically supports his bad habit rather than risking his rejection towards her and making him get help.

Tyrone is a friend of Harry, but most significantly his partner in crime. Tyrone and Harry fall into a trap that is just as bad as doing drugs, they begin selling them. Although Tyrone also takes drugs, he is not a junkie like Harry is.

Marion is a part of this triangle of friends as well. She is actually Harry’s girlfriend, and also a junkie. Apparently she comes from a family of money, but has lost all connections because of her drug habit.

It is not long before things spiral out of control for these four addicts.

Sarah wins a chance to be a contestant on her favorite game show and becomes obsessed with the whole fantasy and is determined to lose weight. She visits her doctor and is prescribed diet pills. (I love how RFAD portrayed how some doctors treat their patients and ironically definitely don’t seem to be very concerned with their patients’ health.) The doctor prescribed Sarah, an older woman, basically a drug that can be compared to speed. Sarah becomes totally infatuated with how great the pills make her feel, but when she becomes immune to them she becomes depressed, confused, and paranoid. Sarah loses her mind and ends up in a psychiatric hospital. She just wanted to be on the show…

Meanwhile, Harry and Tyrone lose their connect to the drugs they sell and not only go broke, but end up in prison. Harry ends up with an unbearable looking infection on his arm from shooting up with dirty needles. Ultimately, because he put off getting the infection treated for so long, the infection became so bad that he had to have surgery and woke up to find his arm had been amputated from the infection down.

Harry’s once beautiful relationship with Marion deteriorates when he isn’t able to supply her with the drugs she needs. Marion wound up having to sell her body to get money for drugs. Prostitution became her source for funding her bad habit. One bad thing leads to another…

Once you’re hooked on a drug, you become so dependent on that substance…mind, body, and soul. Despite all the potential these four people had to be successful in life, they all surrender to their addictions and fail miserably.

Little Children

Little Children is a film I chose to watch outside of class because of a recommendation. The main theme of this film is about the thirst for something more exciting than the repetitive routines of our lives that become what we feel is just merely plain comfortable and nothing extra. Little Children is about the fear of being stuck at a point in our lives with nowhere left to go. Yes, we are all alive, but are we actually LIVING? Although it didn’t leave me quite as stunned as some of the reviews I read stated I would feel, I thought it was really good because of the realities it explored among 2 of the main adult characters; Sarah and Brad.

Sarah is a wife to a man who is addicted to pornography, and a mother to a 4 year old little girl named Lucy. Sarah has a master’s degree in English, but quit school before actually receiving her PhD. She lives in a huge very nice house and is a stay at home mom. She spends her summer days at the park and the pool with Lucy, other children, and judgmental women of which she really doesn’t care to call her friends. Sarah is bored and unhappy with her life until one day when she meets Brad.

Brad is a very good looking man who is a stay at home dad because of his failed attempts to pass the bar exam and become a lawyer. He is married to a beautiful woman who works as a filmmaker, and they have a son the same age as Lucy. Brad’s wife is so consumed in her job and their son that she has forgotten about keeping her marriage exciting and rarely has sex with her husband.

Even though so far in my response it seems like I am describing a chick flick, Little Children soon becomes something much more than 2 unhappy people.

When Sarah and Brad meet at the park, she talks him into sharing a kiss with her to get a good kick out of the other mothers appalled reactions, but it set off a sense of thrill and curiosity of something different that they both continued to think about days after.

Sarah and Brad’s relationship starts off and stays pretty steadily as only strictly friendship at first, but it brings them close on an emotional level which only makes their future affair much more stimulating. Eventually, their friendship turns sexual, and before they know it they are both living a life separate from their regular routines, sneaking around, avoiding responsibilities, becoming selfish, and basically acting like *little children.*

The question is, is it wrong to want more? Is it wrong to want to feel alive? The answer to those questions is no. However, should we pick and choose what is appropriate to bring us bliss? Yes, we should. Sarah and Brad get so enthralled in their affair but soon realize what they are doing is not real. They each have priorities in their lives, and unfortunately none of us get to be young and care free forever.

At the end of the film, Sarah and Brad have plans to meet up one night and run away together, (really? obviously at the peak of acting like little children). I think Sarah and Brad were just trying to run away from reality in general. Sarah leaves her daughter in a swing at the park for a few minutes and Lucy walks off without Sarah even noticing. Brad gets distracted by a bunch of teenage boys skateboarding and stops to join the fun, but ends up crashing which results in unconsciousness. In those very moments, Sarah and Brad begin thinking like adults again and realize what is really important. Sarah finds Lucy and recognizes how she has been neglecting her daughter. Brad recognizes that at a time when he needs comfort, his wife is the first person to come to mind. They both knew that what they had was over, and luckily didn’t have to suffer the dangerous consequences that their affair could have resulted in.

Shortbus

For me, Shortbus is a film that I had to let sink into my mind in order for me to write a response. I think that the whole idea, process, and film itself is definitely different, but I also have a lot of respect for everyone involved and admire all the work that was put into Shortbus. Most of all however, the message it brings to the audience; the whole concept of insecurities, the lack of acceptance from others, and then finally the ability to find happiness, with the help from your own self and people who love you is what I adore about the film. Even though some moments were a little tense, I enjoyed the ride of emotions Shortbus took me on.

At first I felt shocked and a little bit awkward watching a man attempting to give himself head. Also, Sophia and Rob’s beginning sex scenes kind of had me thinking we were about to watch a porn in film class. To be honest, even though I fully support gay rights, I could have done without watching the man on man…on man action. I didn’t really know what to think at first. When the film first exposes Shortbus, which is basically like an underground sex club, I noticed it is definitely a place where there are no boundaries whatsoever when it comes to sexual activity and expression. Shortbus is kind of like a utopia. The film makes sex look like a form of art. Porn however, makes sex look raunchy. Although Shortbus is extremely graphic and full of sex and nudity, I don’t think Shortbus should be considered pornography. Shortbus brings real life troubles to the table, not fantasies and close-ups.

A certain scene in the film that impacted me the most is set in the first visit to Shortbus. In a huge crowd full of totally unique people, the camera focuses on a very elderly man in a business suit sitting alone. Ceth, a young, good looking guy approaches the elderly man because they were matched on some sort of Shortbus social network. The man tells Ceth he is the former New York Mayor and begins to explain how his sexuality has made him feel so unaccepted, unwanted, and judged for his whole life. It made me sad to think some people never get to experience all the love they deserve because they are ashamed of feeling something other than what is considered to be normal, and because they are scared of how society, family, or friends might view or treat them.

One of my favorite characters is James. When talking about love he states, “I see it... all around me... but it stops at my skin. I can't let it inside. It's always been like that. It's always gonna be like that.” Before he met his partner, Jamie, James was a male prostitute. Sex turned into a job for him, he had a distorted image of himself, and he couldn’t let any intimacy into his life. James attempted suicide, but Caleb (a stalker of his) saved his life and convinced James that it is worth living. It goes to show that sometimes people are so numb that they would rather just end their life all together, and that is unfortunate.

Another one of my favorite characters from the film is Sophia. She is a sex/relationship therapist, yet she has been pre-orgasmic her whole life. She spends most of her time helping others but can’t seem to satisfy herself, and neither can her husband. Obviously, she is bound to snap at some point, and when she does she finds her way to Shortbus through 2 of her clients, a gay couple, James and Jamie. Shortbus opens her sexual world up to so many possibilities, but before she finally gets what she needs, all of her other irritated attempts to “pleasure” herself actually bring some comic relief to the film.

Some people were upset that the movie ended happily, but the movie is about overcoming struggles. I was glad that everyone ended up all together at Shortbus and “lived happily ever after”!