Revolutionary Road

Rachel and I watched, on the recommendation of my dad, Revolutionary Road. It stars Leonardo Dicaprio, who I think is a great actor, and Kate Winslet, who apparently is not the same actress from Pirates of the Caribbean. They looked the same to me...

Anyway, the premise of the movie is that this young couple is out to capture the world by the tail. They truly believe that they are destined for great things, to be different, to have a unique life, and so they buy a house on Revolutionary Road, out in the suburbs, and have two children. He works in the city selling computers, she stays at home with the children (at least, I assume that is her task. You rarely see the children, to the point that Rachel and I were both wondering if they were simply rentals or perhaps had been given to the neighbors. This became more and more astounding later on in the movie, for the children simply were never there.)

From what I remember, the movie got terrible reviews. Netflix had it dwelling in the land of two stars, and I can see why. It had a lot of little things that I didn't care for. It is certainly not a movie for children, as it deals with abortion and adultery, as well as having some adult language.

But the heart of the movie is the questions that it forces us to ask ourselves. This is what I found fascinating. Throughout the movie, as you watch this couple struggle with aging and watching dreams pass by without being realized, you are forced to wrestle with questions about your own dreams and your own life. What are your dreams, and what are you prepared to do to make them reality? What dreams can die? What new dreams are born? I think the couple in the movie failed to dream new dreams, instead holding on to old, ambiguous dreams.

This movie asked me to dream big, but it also forced me to think about the things I am doing now to realize my dreams. Dreams are a wonderful thing, but if we fail to follow after them, they simply vanish in the wind, or remain an apparition in the mist, always leading us, never becoming a part of our lives.

It dealt with relationships as well, and as the couple reached out to find physical love to replace the emptiness within, it made me realize how easy it is to let distance grow between spouses. We take each other for granting, failing to be grateful for small things, failing to find wonder in the other. May each day be seen as a blessing, as a gift.

Revolutionary Road was fascinating in the questions it made me ask, in the way it made me think, in the way it tackled deep, deep issues in life.