MY MOVIE SHELF: Sliding Doors

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 180  Days to go: 125

Movie #258:  Sliding Doors

What if a single moment changed your entire life? It’s a question I’ve always been fascinated with, and it’s the central question of Sliding Doors, which makes it one of my all-time favorite films. The movie explores two alternate timelines in the life of our heroine, Helen (Gwyneth Paltrow): one in which she catches the train home, and one in which she does not. It’s a tiny, seemingly insignificant moment in her life, but the movie shows how that one moment cascades into many.

It’s hard to identify what draws me to the question of alternate universes, alternate timelines, and alternate lives. I think I simply am an introspective person who often reflects on how I got to where I am in life, for better or for worse. I’m also pretty attuned to the pivotal moments in my life — the instances that clearly could’ve sent me down a different path had they gone a different way. Like it’s postulated in Rabbit Hole (or in theoretical physics, whatever), each of these moments might actually split off into another reality. There might be millions of me out there, living different lives, in different cities, with different successes and failures. And so it goes with Sliding Doors.

When Helen misses the train, she goes to take a cab home instead and gets a nasty cut on her head when someone tries to mug her. After spending hours in the hospital, she comes home to her boyfriend Gerry (John Lynch), but misses catching him with his mistress Lydia (Jeanne Tripplehorn, who makes weird kiss faces). However, when she makes the train, she runs into the charming James (John Hannah) both before and after coming home early enough to catch Gerry and Lydia together. She moves in with best friend Anna (Zara Turner), gets a sassy short hair cut and color, and opens her own PR firm.

The film could easily split off into two entirely different stories, but instead it interweaves the tales while maintaining some fixed intersection points. In this way, Sliding Doors also plays with the idea of destiny and that, however and whichever timeline you find yourself on, there are certain experiences and paths you are meant to travel — paths that will find you, no matter what. So maybe in all those millions of different mes, I’d actually always wind up here, where I need to be.

It might sound obsessively neurotic, but my mind does cartwheels imagining all those different (or possibly similar) possibilities. I love it, and I love the thoughtfulness put into the film. It’s probably one of the least flashy films I count among my favorites, and yet that subtlety and nuance is what makes it stand out all the more to me. It holds such a special place in my heart, in fact, that it influenced how my husband and I named our youngest child. And now I love it even more.

MY MOVIE SHELF: Four Weddings and a Funeral

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 261 Days to go: 257

Movie #116: Four Weddings and a Funeral

It’s not every film that can give away a major plot point right there in the title and still be a success. I mean, Lone Survivor just kind of got mocked for it. Four Weddings and a Funeral, though, holds true to its name and still manages to deliver a devastating blow when that funeral comes to pass.

Hugh Grant plays Charles in the role that made him a Hollywood star — fidgety, bumbling, adorably awkward, incredibly endearing. He’d get pigeonholed in these types of characters for the rest of the decade, but to be honest I never actually tired of it — even if he’s much sexier and surprising as a rakish bad boy. See, he’s actually good at adorably bumbling, which is one of those things that seems like it would be easy but actually isn’t. Hugh Grant is adept at stuttering through declarations of love or at saying the exact wrong thing to the exact wrong person without ever coming off as a total social parasite. That’s a skill.

Then, of course, there’s Kristin Scott Thomas who is absolutely perfect as Fiona. Secretly in love with Charles, barely tolerable of her brother Tom (James Fleet), and really sort of above it all in general, yet she clearly has a close and strong bond with this band of friends. She loves them dearly, which instantly makes her lovable. And she was a lesbian once in school for about fifteen minutes, so she’s definitely up for living in the moment and trying new things. AND she makes Rowan Atkinson’s socially awkward priest-in-training charmingly twittery. She has virtues. Fiona is condescending and frank in all the best ways and I couldn’t possibly love her more, but then she went and did The English Patient and I’ve never really forgiven her.

The true heart and best character of the movie, though, is undeniably Gareth (Simon Callow), whose boisterous love for life is intoxicating and exhilarating. He brings all the friends together. He embraces life and encourages love and celebration. And his relationship with Matthew (John Hannah) is so beautiful and easy-going, it’s simply the best thing in all the film. (It’s never once commented upon, either, this long-standing homosexual relationship in the center of the film, until Charles mentions sort of off-handedly that it just occurred to him how the two of them were sort of married the whole time and no one knew it. That was a radical statement — a groundbreaking realization at the time, and it’s the most honest and true relationship in the entire film.)

I also love John Hannah and his sexy Scottish accent in absolutely everything — even The Mummy — but what I love most about him here is how centered and calming he is — a perfect counter to Gareth’s boundless energy and rambunctiousness. The eulogy Matthew gives at the titular funeral is gorgeously heartbreaking, and my eyes well up with tears every time.

Scarlett (Charlotte Coleman) rounds out the crew of friends (unless you count Charles’s brother David (David Bower), which I don’t, because he always seems more on the edges, even though he does play a pivotal role in the climax), and I kind of always wanted to be as free-spirited and comfortably eccentric as she was. Sadly, I don’t own a single plastic heart ring. I will remain infinitely glad, however, that she eventually marries a sexy Texan with a great sense of humor who appreciates Scarlett’s verve.

Honestly, the only thing I find troubling about the film is how off-putting and not-at-all-alluring I find Carrie (Andie MacDowell) to be. I mean, other than wearing a fabulous hat to the first wedding, she’s got a questionable fashion sense, a grating accent that seems amplified for some reason (it’s much softer in Groundhog Day, for example, which came first, so it’s not like it’s a matter of it relaxing over time), and her character is solely defined by sex partners and spoiled flippancy. Other than a fabulous roll in the hay, really, it’s hard to figure out what Charles even sees in her. I mean, anyone who goes to the store their wedding is registered at and follows up on whether the expensive items are purchased is kind of comically gauche to begin with, but she’s also flighty and unfaithful and just sort of keeps showing up for no discernible reason. Charles deserves to be not married to someone else, frankly, but then again Charles also is a terrible boyfriend/fiance, so maybe they deserve each other after all.

In fact, everyone seems to be paired up nicely with a perfect match at the end except Matthew (who still seems happy, so at least that’s something) and Fiona, who deserves much much better than Prince Charles. Really, she gets shafted the entire movie. Poor Fiona.