She who must be obeyed went on a trip last week, accompanying her friend who was visiting her mother who was dying of cancer.
Very noble of my wife to go along to support her friend; and I had visions of her sat quietly in the hospital, holding hands with the infirm and weeping quietly. Instead I received an SMS containing a list of movies that she urgently required me to download. Blame the Thai Airlines in-flight magazine, I discovered later, which prints insipid reviews of insipid movies with extensive use of phrases such as “heart warming” and “suitable for all ages”. Such movies usually go straight to DVD and/or The Hallmark Channel. Here’s some facts about the Hallmark Channel:
Percentage of movies about families muddling through under difficult circumstances: 87%
Percentage of movies about orphans muddling through under difficult circumstances: 12%
Percentage of movies about dogs muddling through under difficult circumstances: 1%
Percentage of movies which have happy endings: 100%
Perentage of movies featuring AK-47s and blow-jobs: 0%
But, being a dutiful husband, I entered the tremendous world of torrents and was disappointed to find that most of her choices were available. Last night we watched the first one: “Henry Poole is here”.
Henry Poole is played by Luke Wilson whose acting talent is restricted to furrowing his brow and looking depressed. He does this to not-Oscar-winning effect throughout the movie, because Henry Poole is a sad man, living alone in a rundown house he has just bought. It doesn’t take long to work out that Henry has come here to die; although, on the assumption that anyone who sits through a movie like this must be stupid, there is a flashback where a doctor invents a fatal disease that someone can die of without showing any actual symptoms for the entire duration of a movie.
But then he meets the single Mum who lives next door who is implausibly attractive and has a cute daughter who doesn’t speak because Daddy left home. From this we immediately surmise that Henry will end up with the single Mum, and because there is a child involved, he is not going to die and they will all live happily ever after.
But wait, there’s more! Henry’s other neighbour is an old lady who has religion, and at the supermarket there is a check-out girl who is geeky and charming and has glasses with monster lenses. A wall of Henry’s house has a stain and the old lady decides it is the face of Jesus; and look, it bleeds! All sorts of weirdos turn up, including the little girl from next door who can then speak again and the girl from the check-out who gets 20-20 vision. I wished I could touch the wall and pray for the movie to go away; but we have to sit through what feels like hours of nonsense before Henry knocks down the wall and is found to be not actually dying after all! How we cheered. How I mocked.
I feel I have not done justice to this movie, it is actually much much worse than I have described it. The official blurb says the movie *investigates the unexpected wonders of the everyday. A faithless man finds hope. A hopeless man finds love. Whether backyard miracles are real or triggered by hope and belief, their personal effects are permanent. *
I think that is sufficient warning to stay well away.