| Mitch Albom's "Have a Little Faith" [message #93101] |
Mon, 08 February 2021 12:02  |
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Wayne Parham
Messages: 18675
Registered: January 2001
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Illuminati (33rd Degree) |
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I saw a fantastic movie this weekend. It's called "Have a Little Faith" and it is a movie adaptation of a book written by Mitch Albom. He's done some other stuff too - I just learned about him - and I'll definitely be checking out his other work.
I was soldering boards for kits and half watching the TV, and my wife Kelly - as usual - had on the Hallmark channel. Every show on Hallmark is a total chick-flick, following a very predictable formula. But it's sweet and cute that she loves those shows, so I don't mind a bit.
The format usually is this: Boy meets girl, they fall in love and it's perfect at first. But there are complications and a mini-crisis develops. They get angry or have some kind of misunderstanding and go off the rails. Looks like things are over for them. Then someone discovers the truth, they go to the other, cry a little tear and make up. They kiss and roll credits.
That's not all that's on Hallmark though. Sometimes they have Christmas shows where boy meets girl. Sometimes they're farmers. Sometimes they're business people. Sometimes the girl is a white-witch. But all in all, most Hallmark shows have pretty much that same theme.
But not all. There is the occasional inspirational film, sometimes in a sort of faith-based or self-help genre.
So that brings me to this one. Kelly clicked on the show, "Have a Little Faith." I could hear it in the background, and occasionally looked up to see what was happening. It was really good, I could tell. This one was the faith-based kind of film, sort of like David Wilkerson's "Cross and the Switchblade," from the 1970s. Remember that one? With Pat Boone and Eric Estrada? Seems like every church youth group played that in their gymnasiums for the kids in the 70s. But I digress.
Mitch Albom's "Have a Little Faith" has two stories going simultaneously, with separate but interleaved relationships to the author. Both profoundly impact the author, a sportswriter and newspaper columnist.
The sportswriter/columnist is a secular Jew who hasn't really been involved in his faith since he was young. He has a Christian wife and is happily married. His relationship with his wife and his friends acts as a backdrop, in that he regularly discusses his feelings and observations with his friends and his wife. He's pretty well-rounded in his relationships.
His childhood rabbi, Albert Lewis, reaches out to him with a strange request: He asks the journalist to write his elegy, which of course begs the questions of "why do you want me to do it?" and "what, are you afraid you're going to die soon?" So the journalist re-engages his relationship with the rabbi, and what started as a quick interview becomes an eight-year ongoing and active relationship.
The movie then introduces the second main relationship. Henry Covington is a poor black man living in Detroit who grows up in a difficult home, and later turns to using and dealing drugs. He is also wrongly accused of a murder, which of course, causes resentment of God and country. So he has a lot of difficulties in his early to middle age. But he hits a bottom and turns his life around before meeting the journalist.
So the movie shows the personal histories, intertwined interactions and lessons learned by all these characters. It is really good.
I ended up watching it three times. Once with Kelly, while working. Once without distractions. And once with my son, Eddie. I loved it every time. It's my kinda stuff.
You can watch it on Amazon Prime. I don't expect any of you dudes would have or get the Hallmark Channel. But if you're a lady that has Hallmark or if you're a guy that has a subscription 'cause of your wife, you can watch it there.
If you don't have either Amazon Prime or the Hallmark Streaming Service, buy the DVD. It's worth it.
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