Tbere is a movie I’m scared to watch again. A film, a science fiction film. I’m not going to tell you what it is in case you haven’t seen it. It is one of the all-time greats. And yes, I’m saying that after seeing it once…and that once was two years ago. It is so good and if you’ve seen it, you’ll soon know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, I think I can say what I want to say in a way that won’t spoil anything, as long as I can preserve the identity of the film.

I’m not even going to talk about the plot. I’m going to talk about the ending and the big idea, the big reveal: what if you knew what was going to happen in the future, and that there would be almost unbearable tragedy and sadness in your life as a result of certain choices you made that also had brought you beauty and joy and happiness….yet the outcome, if you made the same certain choices, was inevitable and tragic?

Would you go through the same life, experiencing the same relationships and moments, knowing how things ended?

I’m nervous to watch again because the idea is so profound and unsettling and it is unveiled in such a masterful way. The storyline itself is suspenseful, mysterious, enthralling, scary, keeps you guessing and trying to figure out what’s happening. It’s delicious on its own as a great story. But it’s the big reveal at the end that packs a whopper of an emotional knockout. I’ve thought about it countless times.

Pretty sure most people can come up with a version that hits close to home. If you knew that something awful or terribly sad was going to happen down the road, would you prevent it…and oh, by the way, the cost of preventing it is that you lose out on the relationships that bring you meaning and joy , but all the while knowing how it’s going to end up. Would you protect yourself from something terrible in the end, if it meant giving up something wonderful before that?

It is such a beautiful and disturbing thought, and one well worth coming back to in considering the choices we’ve made and what we would change if we could. When sadness hits our lives, what would we pay to have it removed, and if we could go back to the past and somehow stop it from happening in the future, would we do so, and exorcise the tragic by ripping out the beauty that came before.

This film, based on a fantastic short story by a certain very talented science fiction short story writer, profoundly grabbed me. I want to watch it with people I care about; I want to share it. But I know everything hits everybody differently. It may just be another flick to spend two hours watching to some. I don’t want to lose the love I have for it after a single viewing; a viewing that has retroactively become more and more meaningful to me.

The entire film is delicious. Something else delicious: the first verse and chorus of Jeff Lynne’s Down Came the Rain.

You let me go when I was down
You let me fall when I could drown
You knew how much you meant to me
You took me down that slippery slope
You left me there without a hope
You saw just what you wanted to see

Down came the rain

Heartbreaking and beautiful, played and sung by the concept-album, sci-fi channeling, George Harrison-sounding Mr. Lynne, formerly of Electric Light Orchestra.

ELO did a lot of wonderful songs, and Lynne did some solid solo stuff, but one thing I love about Down Came the Rain is that it’s not the whole song I’m drawn to: it’s a part. The track itself runs a little long for me; the chorus drags on at the end. But the opening sixty seconds…I can listen over and over.

Sometimes the entirety of something is incredible.
Sometimes every single little thing about a person seems incredible.
And sometimes it’s a part of something or someone that’s incredible.

We have to find the beauty for ourselves where we can find it; frame every situation or experience through the viewfinder that maximizes our ability to create or document or identify beauty.

We have to do so knowing that so much is ephemeral and the way of nature is entropy; disintegration; that the beauty and wonder and love and things and people we hold dear are part of our lives for unknowable periods of time, and we have to grab the good and imprint them onto ourselves. The beautiful times may come with a price, but it doesn’t mean they’re not worth it, and the dark times may come with unexpectedly upbeat conclusions. Until, of course, that whole death thing which infects most of us at some point, I hear.

(that was intended to be moderately bleak and mildly humorous humor)

I regret some of the times I have hurt people. I regret not seizing certain opportunities. I regret saying yes to some things and no to others. But…

…maybe I don’t. Maybe I don’t regret them because of the messy way that beauty and sadness can be all jumbled up together. Some of the most difficult times in my adult life led to some of the most joyful times, and those joyful times presaged a new phase of tougher times. So what would I take away, what would I remove from the past, if it made things less sad in the present?