It
was March of 2007, and I was late for a screening of a new
movie called "The Namesake." I had sprinted across
town to make it to the movie on time, but I was still a good
10 minutes late when I reached the block where the screening
was taking place.
Waiting for me was my friend Emily, who had started coming to
a good many screenings since we had started hanging out in
January. She had attended Arrowhead High School just like me.
I was in her sister’s year and remembered Erin more than
Emily. But years later I had bumped into Emily at my friend’s
birthday party. We had grabbed tea and started hanging out in
the weeks and months to come.
It was a Tuesday night, just like any other screening on a
Tuesday. Yet from the moment I met up with Emily and hopped
the escalator, sweating profusely and in a frantic rush, I
could sense something that I couldn’t quite put my finger
on. She looked gorgeous, and seemed fine with the fact that
she had been waiting for me almost half an hour for a movie
she knew nothing about.
If not for my deadline, I would have suggested dinner instead
of a movie, but instead we made it in the theater by the end
of the opening credits, at the start of a story about an
Indian family across the generations. Jumping backward and
forward in time, the great director Mira Nair had molded a
story about children and parents who existed in different
worlds, who nevertheless followed in the same footsteps. In
modern-day New York City, grown Indian children are falling
love, reminding the parents of the same leaps of faith they
made in their younger days – involving not only who to marry
but also the journey across the ocean to establish a whole new
life in a whole new culture.
The cross-pollination was now well underway, with children
aspiring for an American dream, falling in love with people of
varying backgrounds and personal histories. Partway through
the film, the family takes the journey back to their cultural
roots, and it has a profound effect on the children, who had
never before considered all the travails that had preceded
their birth.
It’s a brilliant work about family, about passing forward to
future generations a sense of both freedom and obligation,
about young love becoming old love – which then brings
forward young love yet again. And as all these themes started
running through my heads my mind kept coming back to the woman
sitting to my left – the woman I had started calling on a
daily basis. Here was a woman who was a link to my past and
yet unlike anything I had ever encountered – a woman who
seemed like she would make a fun partner in crime. And being a
film major from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, at least
I knew she had good taste in movies.
I was overcome by the sensation that I should try to hold her
hand. And while I didn’t, I still remember the wave of
emotion brought out by "The Namesake." It’s in
that movie theater where I think I fell in love not just with
a new girlfriend, but with the incredible, vivacious, patient
and exciting woman who would become my wife. We would move in
together the following January, get engaged the ensuing July
and start planning for the wedding that will take place this
Saturday in Madison.
So imagine my surprise when I was flipping through the
upcoming calendar for the Union Theater at the University of
Wisconsin-Milwaukee and saw the programming for this weekend.
Screening Friday, Saturday and Sunday is "The
Namesake" – around the time Emily and I will be cutting
our cake in Madison, the movie that brought us together will
be screening 60 miles to the east.
They say good things come to you when you least expect it.
Well I was expecting to see just another movie and instead I
found myself marveling at the philosophy that good fortune
comes through family and fate, and an openness to new
experiences. "The Namesake" is about going back to
your roots, to find the strength to venture forward into a
whole new world. And so instead of just a movie, I found
myself going back in time to rediscover the Arrowhead girl
that got away. I found a friend, an adventurer, a film critic,
a scholar and the elegant angel of my dreams.
We might just be there Sunday night, reliving that moment of
realization – two rings on the fingers, our faces sore from
all the smiling.
And this time you bet I’ll be
holding that hand.
What movie made you fall in love? Tell Steve at SnyderReviews@hotmail.com E-mail:
SnyderReviews@hotmail.com
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