Stupid Is As Stupid Does

Just a li’l confusing, that title…eh? It’s just a quote from my all time favorite movie, Forrest Gump. And having said that, this post is, more so than not, a li’l review of that movie. Oh yeah, I know…it’s a li’l too late a review for a movie that’s 11 years old, but what the heck!

Ok, first let me tell you why am posting this now. Well...it so happened that 2 days back I was checking out some community sites and while registering, they all asked me what’s my favorite movie. And, though I have a bunch of them to talk about, Forrest Gump is like the best one. I don’t know many people who like that movie as much as I do. In fact, most of them ask me what’s so special about that movie, that I’d watched it like a million times and can still do it another billion. And the truth is, I don’t know.

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So yesterday, I just let my mind wander into that fascinating world of Forrest Gump. Just wanted to see if I can really figure out why I love it so much. Is it the movie I love, or is it the character?

Directed by Robert Zemeckis and starring Tom Hanks in the title role, with a supporting cast of Robin Wright as the love of his life Jenny, Gary Sinise as Lt. Daniel Taylor, Sally Field as his oft-quoted Momma, Forrest Gump was one of the best movies of 1994. It won the Best Picture Oscar for a reason, along with the Best Actor by Tom Hanks. One of the reviews of the movie says…

“Ever find the grind of life getting you down? Is the day-to-day struggle threatening to drag you under? If so, there is a movie out there that can replenish your energy and refresh your outlook. Passionate and magical, Forrest Gump is a tonic for the weary of spirit. For those who feel that being set adrift in a season of action movies is like wandering into a desert, the oasis lies ahead.”

Hanks is by far one of the best actors we have today. He had won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in the movie Philadelphia (1993) and Forrest Gump won him the second, the very next year. In Philadelphia his character, Andrew Beckett, is a gay law graduate with a promising career ahead of him, who finds himself to be having AIDS. The firm he works for fires him for an unjustified cause and he takes his case to a number of lawyers, including Joe Miller (Denzel Washington), a black. But none of them is willing to represent him. . The scene where Andrew comes out of Miller’s office, feeling dejected and alone, is still one of my favorites.

Forrest Gump is basically one simple man's journey through life. And boy! What a journey. The movie opens with Forrest sitting at a bus stop, waiting to go see Jenny after being apart from her for years. Forrest strikes up a conversation or two with the people that come and wait for the bus with him. Or, more accurately, he keeps talking regardless of whether anybody is listening or not.

“Hello. My name's Forrest Gump
You want a chocolate?
I could eat about a million and a half of these. My momma always said life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get. Momma's talking nonsense, of course. You know exactly what you're going to get in a box of chocolates. You just have to read that little piece of card inside the lid.”

Forrest grows up in Greenbow, Alabama, where his mother runs a boarding house. He is a little "slow", his IQ being 75, 5 below the state's definition of "normal", but his mental impairment doesn't bother him, his mother, or his best and only friend, Jenny. In fact, the naiveness that comes through a limited understanding of the world around him gives Forrest a uniquely positive perspective of life. The movie is done as a flashback, with Forrest taking us through all the major events of his life and narrating them. During the three decades of his life that he takes us through, we see him grow up and going through school, college, become a star football player, join the army and become a war hero in Vietnam. He meets the President three times on different occasions…

(Forrest meets President Richard Nixon, who asks him where he is staying, and then offers to put Forrest up in a much nicer hotel. Forrest is shown making a phone call at the hotel to send a maintenance man to the suite, which is being burgled. It turns out to be the Watergate Hotel and implies that the phone call he made began the infamous Watergate scandal, without him ever knowing it!)

…appears in a talk show alongside John Lennon and he even becomes a highly successful businessman in the shrimping business with his fortune invested in “some kind of a fruit company” (oh, and that’s Apple Computers, by the way!!) by his friend. And through it all, there is one defining element in his life: his love for Jenny. She is never far from his thoughts, no matter what he's doing or where he is. He writes to her every single day, even when at war in Vietnam!

It seems Forrest Gump's warm reception was not universal. This is what I found from the net.

Particularly outside the United States, the film was viewed as extended and undeserved praise of ignorant naiveness, a stereotypical trait widely associated with Americans in some quarters. Others note that Gump's successes result from doing what he is told by others, and never showing any of initiative of his own, in contrast to Jenny's more forthright and independent character who is shown descending into drugs, prostitution and death. Still others point out that much like Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire," it was a premature overly generous homage to the Baby Boomer generation. Like Joel's 1989 single, the film celebrates what that generation witnessed (but to which it did not contribute), criticizes what that generation condemned (but to which it does not offer corrections), and yet absolves it of any responsibility for its shortcomings and failures.

But I think Forrest Gump has several messages to convey, some of which are less obvious than others. The most important of them however is a word of advice, not to give up on life. Why surrender when you don't even know what lies ahead or round the corner?

The movie, based on the novel by Winston Groom, is however said to be quite deviating from the book. I haven’t read the book, but really would love to. I haven’t been able to get hold of it, as the ones they sell here is the movie version. Anyways, it seems much of the beginning of the film is the same in the book, albeit Zemeckis's Gump is far more placid and naïve than Groom's abrasive, judgmental cynic. They say the film's quote of "Life is like a box of chocolates" wholly reverses the novel's sentiment of "Being an idiot is no box of chocolates".

Whatever be it, Forrest Gump is my favorite movie and will remain so. But why? Am not so sure yet, but I think it’s mainly because of the innocence of the character, which remains a child in heart and spirit, even as his body grows to maturity. And maybe for the message - never give up on life. And I love the innocence and the hidden wisdom in his seemingly stupid words.

“My momma always said life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get. Momma's talking nonsense, of course. You know exactly what you're going to get in a box of chocolates. You just have to read that little piece of card inside the lid”

“My momma always said you could tell a lot about a person by the shoes they wear.”

“Stupid is as stupid does.”

[Speaking about his Vietnam days]
“We was always taking these real long walks, looking for this guy named Charlie.”

“The best thing about visiting the President is the food! Now, since it was all free, and I wasn't hungry but thirsty, I must've drank me about fifteen Dr.Peppers.”

[In the Watergate hotel; on phone with security]
“Yeah, sir, you might want to send a maintenance man over to that office across the way. The lights are off, and they must be looking for a fuse box, 'cause them flashlights, they keep me awake.”

[When his girlfriend Jenny runs out of rocks to throw at the house where her father molested her]
“I guess sometimes there just aren't enough rocks.“

[Speaking about Lieutenant Daniel Taylor]
“He was from a long great military tradition. Somebody from his family had fought and died in every single American war. I guess you could say he had a lot to live up to.”

“Bubba was my best good friend. And even I know that ain't something you can find just around the corner.”

“Bubba was gonna be a shrimpin' boat captain, but instead he died right there by that river in Vietnam.”

“That day, for no particular reason, I decided to go for a little run. So I ran to the end of the road. And when I got there, I thought maybe I'd run to the end of town. And when I got there, I thought maybe I'd just run across Greenbow County. And I figured, since I run this far, maybe I'd just run across the great state of Alabama. And that's what I did. I ran clear across Alabama. For no particular reason I just kept on going. I ran clear to the ocean. And when I got there, I figured, since I'd gone this far, I might as well turn around, just keep on going. When I got to another ocean, I figured, since I'd gone this far, I might as well just turn back, keep right on going.”

“My Mama always said you've got to put the past behind you before you can move on.”

“Mama always said, dying was a part of life.”

“We were like peas and carrots, Jenny and I.“

“I don't know if we each have a destiny, or if we're all just floatin' around accidental-like on a breeze. But I, I think maybe it's both.”

[When Lieutenant Daniel Taylor asks him: Have you found Jesus yet, Gump?]
“ I didn't know I was supposed to be looking for him, sir.”

And my personal favorite:
“I may not be a smart man, but I know what love is.”

The tag line for the movie was, "The world will never be the same once you've seen it through the eyes of Forrest Gump"

How true!