Friday Column on Moonrise Kingdom Movie

Our youngest daughter came to visit for a few days and we went to see Moonrise Kingdom. It is a marvel to me that the little girl with whom I watched Disney movies is now an astute observer of media technique and culture. It’s directed by Wes Anderson, who has, let’s call it, a skewed, odd sensibility. The setting is an island with a scout camp in 1965, as a storm approaches. Like many of his movies, it deals in the difficulty of human connection. Two twelve year olds know that they are in love. They run away to a place they call Moonrise Kingdom, as the girl is filled with romantic notions of stories set from the Middle Ages. One of the small troubles of being a minister is that experiences get translated into sermon illustrations or links to matters spiritual. This movie gives a lot of grist for that mill. I had forgotten how gifted Bruce Willis is a playing a gentle, lost character. Indeed, most of the adults seem a bit lost in the movie, especially about dealing with children. The girl has brothers, but they seem to be raising themselves in a cold, regimented household. I forgot how much of a military cast scout camp can have. They walk around as if life has drained the energy of childhood out of them. It is less that they exhibit calm before a storm but that they are utterly becalmed. The adults are lost, and he reminds us that children can be actively cruel. It does not matter if they are in families, in the scouts, or perfect strangers. Reconciliation can occur, however. The scouts realize that they have betrayed their code and discover their humanity in breaking the rules. The parents of the girl can work out, in their stilted way, a commitment to each other. The police officer can discover a way to enlarge his own emotional island. We cannot be islands to each other, for we are made for connection. In the movie About a Boy, the selfish Hugh Grant character would like to remain an island to himself, but he moves to admitting that perhaps he could live with being part of an island chain. Wes Anderson is fascinated by the dream of escape. Part of us cannot help but root for the escapees and against the search parties. I am not educated enough to figure out why Benjamin Britten’s music is such an integral part of the film. I would surmise that the educational component of his introduction to classical music serves as a counterpoint to the relationships in the movie. The orchestra shows how different pieces, although different, can work together. Just as the simple New England sanctuary can become a sanctuary of art, it also becomes a physical sanctuary for people during the storm. Paul famously poses a chasm between the life of the flesh and the life of the spirit. We slip into thinking he means the sins of the flesh, but when he lists troubles, he is usually concerned with vices that can poison human relationships. If placed in Moonrise Kingdom Paul would say that they all demonstrate a spiritless existence and so live enervated, sleepwalking lives. Perhaps no one demonstrates the soulless character of bureaucratic existence more than the woman designated as Social Services. While looking out for the welfare of children, she seems more concerned with creating and following the rules of paperwork. Movies can be gateways to consider the nature of being a human being. They are safe places, sanctuaries, to explore aspects of life together. Even odd, stilted movies cast light on the odd and stilted experience we encounter and create in everyday life.