PAY IT FORWARD

 

FOUR STARS - Encouraging

 

 

       When Jesus came to earth and was put to death, many people misunderstood the message.  They thought that his crucifixion was a sign of failure.  They thought that the darkness of the world had overcome the Light.  But as time went on and one individual reached out to another who reached out to another with the same sacrificial love that Jesus showed, a movement began which is still multiplying two thousand years later.

       With profound authenticity, director Mimi Leder gives us a fictional example of this power of self-sacrificing love.  Based on a novel by Catherine Ryan Hyde, “Pay It Forward” presents the story of a young 12 year old boy who becomes a Christ figure in his faith-filled attempt to change the world.

       Set in Las Vegas, Trevor McKinney (Haley Joel Osment) is the only son of a struggling mother whose alcohol addiction has imprisoned her life.  Arlene McKinney (Helen Hunt) is herself the child of an alcoholic mother named Grace (Angie Dickinson) and the ex-wife of an abusive alcoholic husband.

       One of the major strengths of the film is its understanding of the impact of alcohol addiction on generations of people.  The broken promises, the parentified child, the struggle with recovery, the distillation of hopes, the necessity of trust, all are masterfully woven together such that the viewer walks with Trevor, Arlene and Grace in their pain.

       Into these bottled-up lives comes a very unusual teacher of Trevor’s seventh grade social studies class, Mr. Eugene Simonet (Kevin Spacey). 

       Living behind the scars of body and soul, Mr. Simonet challenges his students to come up with an idea that can change the world.  Trevor accepts the challenge.

       Creating a concept called “Pay it forward,” he decides that if he could just help three people who would in turn help three people, who would help three more people, a movement could begin which would change everyone.

       This ancient principle of discipleship, where a person invests his or her life into a small number of people, who in turn invest their lives in others, is laughed at by the seventh graders in Trevor’s class.  They believe, as many today have decided, that such attempts are “utopian” and “naive” and don’t realistically understand the nature of human beings.

        Trevor struggles with his inability to see immediate results from his actions.   True to life, seeds planted take time to blossom.  But when they do, beauty is brought forth.

       Though their critique is a problem for the humanistic philosophy young Trevor is presenting, the film doesn’t take away the hope of such a dream, while still depicting the difficulty of people to actually change the directions of their lives.

       This struggle is seen most powerfully in the lives of Trevor’s own family and his attempt to get his single mother connected to Mr. Simonet.  The hope and faith of this young man who should have been a bundle of despair is a moving testimony both to the human spirit and our ability to forgive and believe.

       Though belief in ourselves is part of the necessary ingredients to change the world, any solution which begins and ends with humanity will only be incomplete, however moving the tale might be.  The success of the movement which Jesus began is not just based on the example of his willingness to sacrifice himself for others, but it is also based on his resurrection power to transform death into life.   When our faith is combined with God’s power, then the hopes and dreams of our souls will come true.

 

(570 words)

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