Monday, April 05, 2010

Permanent Collection



What happens when you finally get something you have wanted for a very long time and don't want it anymore? This is the question posed by Up In The Air, a film I just watched on dvd again and love. George Clooney plays Ryan Bingham, a man who knows himself well. He doesn't want marriage, children, or a permanent place to live. He makes a living firing people and teaching others to rid themselves of baggage. He practices what he preaches; his apartment is as sparse as a monk's cell and his backpack contains only essentials, the most important ones being those elite status cards that tell him who he is. Contrary to popular belief, there aren't that many perks to being a gold member. It's more the idea of yourself as a person who deserves more than the other unwashed masses -- that's what places are selling, not a better seat on the plane or a cookie at check-in.

Of course, Ryan changes over the course of the film. He falls in love, that transformative force. He takes a risk that he didn't imagine he would take, and it doesn't work out. He gets what he wants (reaching the ten million air mile point), but he finds it's not at all as he imagined. Even though he's most himself surrounded by strangers who know his name, he doesn't know who he is. Like the people he fires, he finds himself completely adrift, trying to figure out what to do with the rest of his life. He looks at that familiar screen with all those arrivals and departures. Where will he go from here? It feels as hopeless as those without work, but it's not. He has all those miles; he can go anywhere he wants.

Michelle's Spell of the Day
"Anything worth doing is worth overdoing." Mick Jagger

Cocktail Hour
Drinking cable suggestion: How To Make It In America

Benedictions and Maledictions
Happy Monday!

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm a Monkey!--M. Jagger

Anonymous said...

Call off the evil monkies!!--MB

Anonymous said...

Hey, hey we're the monkees!!!--M. Dolenz, et al.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the review, Michelle, and I loved your Oscar party, especially Weezer playing "Beverly Hills." Everything goes better with champagne. I almost turned conservatve that night!--G. Clooney

Heff said...

That George Clooney, what an actor.

Anonymous said...

I've lost my Norton protection!!--G. Clooney

Lana Gramlich said...

I remember watching previews for that movie...Thought it might be good. I think we missed it on satellite already, but we might have it at the library.

the walking man said...

I think it best to not want or long for much because it seems the harder you have to wait for something the less appealing it is when it appears. Just let the good shit happen and it will and the appreciation of it will be the greater for it.

Anonymous said...

There will be a renaissance in Detroit!--Coleman A. Young

Anonymous said...

Slower than the second coming of Jesus!--Slim Pickens

Anonymous said...

Yes, start lining up for the grape punch!--J. Jones

Anonymous said...

Nothing, nothing, nothing at all.--Archibald MacLeish

Anonymous said...

Sooooooooon.--MB

Charles Gramlich said...

I've having some thoughts along these lines from something going on in my life now. It's very very strange is all I can say.