Director: Robert Zemeckis
Year: 1994
In honour of the twentieth anniversary of
1994’s Best Picture winner at the Oscars, I thought it only fitting to review
the iconic Forrest Gump. Young, old or in between, chances are you’ve seen this
film, perhaps more than once. Me? I was rather late to the party. I only
watched the film in it’s entirety last year as part of one of my assignments
for a History of the Sixties course. Of course seeing the other contenders for
Best Picture (Pulp Fiction, Shawshank Redemption), Forrest Gump wasn’t at all
what I expected to win.
For those of you who haven’t seen the film,
it follows the life of a young man named Forrest Gump who has the
characteristics of the village idiot. He moves through momentous historical
periods and events meeting idols like Elvis, John Lennon, JFK and LBJ. He
fights in Vietnam, starts a multi-million dollar shrimping company, runs across
the continental US, becomes a ping pong champion, invests shares in Apple all
the while chasing his childhood sweetheart Jenny.
One of the great things about Forrest Gump
is its use of contrasts. Forrest and Jenny are set up to compliment each other.
Jenny embodies the times and follows the youth movements whereas Forrest takes
on a more conservative approach. This is an example of the split American society
during the sixties – do we protest and live the hippie lifestyle or remain the
conservative Cold War society? The more obvious contrast is stupidity vs.
intelligence. The execution of this idea, however, is not what is expected.
Instead of Forrest exemplifying his own stupidity, he reveals the stupidity of
those around him. Gump’s naivety allows him to see past social convention and
gives him more common sense than is common. Aside from the famous tagline “life
is like a box of chocolates”, one that really sticks in my mind is “stupid is
as stupid does”. This suggests that a person’s stupidity is measured by their
actions. By this definition, Forrest Gump is the smartest man in the film.
As I watched the film I couldn’t help but
notice Gump’s insertion into historical events functioning as a sort of
“fixing” of history. This seemed particularly evident in the scene where
Governor Wallace refuses to allow black students into the college. Gump, first
mistaking the slang “coons” for raccoons, is unaware of the political nature of
the situation, nor its controversy. He naively picks up the book one of the
black students dropped and courteously hands it back to her. Like most
instances of Gump’s role in history, his involvement is accidental. His actions
illustrate him as a “race traitor” and he appears to be making a statement
about the acceptance of integration in the Jim Crow south. Gump does not see
the girl as black but rather as just another person. His strong
characterization as stupid in the moments leading up to this scene make the
audience realize the ridiculousness of Governor Wallace and the controversy
surrounding integration. His common sense action to hand the girl the book
reveals the stupidity of those opposing integration, and choosing to see the
black students as an other, instead of his own.
The Civil Rights movement characterized a
large portion of the sixties and “Forrest Gump” does not skimp on the
importance of the overturning of racial discrimination. Another defining event
of the sixties was of course the Vietnam War. These two ideas come together
through Gump’s friendship with Bubba, a black colleague and solider who serves
with him. The friendship is unrestricted by race and comes to resemble more of
a fraternal relationship than a friendship. Gump’s desperation to save Bubba
after a run in with the Viet Cong results in the US troops bombing the entire
area shows how deep their bond runs. Gump’s decision to then captain a
shrimping boat in order to live out Bubba’s dream is his ultimate ode to his
late friend. His friendship with Bubba is a rejection of his white supremacist
background (his namesake was the founder of the KKK) and an undoing of
segregationist ideals stereotypically expected from a white southerner. Again,
it is Gump’s stupidity that allows him to see past the colour of Bubba’s skin
and instead befriend him as a person, not as a black man. Zemeckis essentially
flips the bird to white supremacist society when Gump presents Bubba’s family
with their share of “Bubba Gump Shrimp” earnings allowing Bubba’s mother to not
only give up her job as someone else’s housemaid but even to hire a housemaid
of her own, a white one. This role reversal is quite subtle but satisfactory
and shows hope for the success of black escalation in society.
The mentality of the sixties runs through
this film. Here I have mainly discussed the role of race and the illustration
of the civil rights movement. The film also looks at the consequences and
casualties of Vietnam as represented by Lieutenant Dan, and the expression of
rebelliousness and the counterculture as represented by Jenny. Like many films,
the historical period in which “Forrest Gump” was released also has a
significant racial link. 1994 was a year of huge achievement in South Africa with
the first multi-racial vote in April and the election of Nelson Mandela as the
first African president of South Africa. The overcoming of racism and the
stigma of white supremacy in “Forrest Gump” can be seen as a message of race
acceptance and a heightening of racial conscience.
Forrest
Gump has many meanings beyond face value and its
dissection of American society is eye opening. Whether you’re a history
enthusiasts or you just like something with a great plot and some humour, this
is definitely a film to watch. "That's all I have to say about that."
KEEP
Rating: 8/10
No comments:
Post a Comment