HOPE FLOATS

 

THREE STARS - Thoughtful

 

 

        An unexpected finding of a study of high school students is that the most popular students in high school have a far more likely chance of being unhappy as adults.

        Though we can only conjecture what the reasons might be for such a finding, “Hope Floats” is a case-study of how this truth is experienced in the lives of two people.

        Birdie Calvert (Sandra Bullock) and Bill Pruitt (Michael Paré) were high school sweethearts at the top of their small Texas town’s social ladder.  Birdie was not only a cheerleader and prom queen, but also the “Queen of Corn” for three years in their town’s festival. 

        Bill Pruitt was the quarterback of the high school football team.  As the top male and female of their school, it was natural that they would get married and go off together to find their fortune.

        The film begins about 20 years after high school as Bill and Birdie live in Chicago.  Birdie’s best friend sets Birdie up on a TV talk show to reveal to her a year long love affair with her husband and his decision to divorce her.  There, on national TV, Birdie is publicly humiliated by her husband and best friend.

        It is this betrayal which sets the stage for a fascinating exploration of social systems and the impact they have on the lives of all of us.

        In a way that could not be more powerfully presented, Birdie is confronted with the emptiness of her relationships.  This is often the painful discovery of beautiful, wealthy and popular persons.  Rather than being loved and cared for as individuals, the beautiful and wealthy are often courted both by lovers and friends as trophies to be won, rather than persons to be loved.

        When Birdie realizes that the two people she thought were closest to her were both betraying her, the emptiness of her life is finally acknowledged and she returns home with her daughter to start over.

        This is the beginning of hope.  As Birdie’s mother Ramona (Gena Rowlands) explains it,  “when the storms of life overwhelm us, ‘Hope Floats’ to the top of the torrent.”

        Though not a usual way of expressing this truth, it is often the experience of people that being knocked down becomes the beginning of a whole new life based on a far stronger footing than we once had.

        Birdie knows she needs to make some changes, but doesn’t know how to proceed.  At one time she could see it in Bill’s eyes that he saw her as an “audacious” woman, attracted to her presence.  But, she said, she realized that slowly his view of her had changed.   She tried to change into the person she thought Bill wanted her to be, but in the end there was nothing in his eyes when he looked at her.

        This experience of trying to be what others want us to be has a devastating consequence:  We neither please them nor us.  We become a shell of a person, losing our self in the process.  It takes usually only time until we and they realize this fact.  Then their new relationship can begin.

        The problem in this instance is that Bill decides to discard Birdie and replace her with another woman.  He discards his daughter Bernice in the same move.

        This is unconscionable.  The cry of his mouth that his new love is a second chance and he’s going to take it is empty and selfish as it is reflected in his cold rejection of his daughter as she cries to go with him.

        Discarded and returned to her mother’s home, Birdie begins to get in touch with her lost self.  First in her encounters with her mother and father, and then in the rekindling of a relationship with an adoring man who had loved her from afar in high school, Birdie begins to find her place within the structure of her family and community.

               This film could have been greatly enriched had the spiritual and moral values of Bill and Birdie’s lives been explored.  Instead they seem to be drifting directionless upon the currents of this world, victims of whatever is floating around them rather than grounded on a living hope.

        For us, the emptiness of Birdie’s life is also reflected in the void of this film.  Hope is a great and marvelous thing.  It is not just the wishful desire of a hurting person, but it is the gift of God to those who turn to Him for their second chance.

 

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