Thursday, June 25, 2009

My Sister’s Keeper: my must-see movie

Ahh, karma.  Sometimes you love it, sometimes you hate it.  Tuesday, I loved it.

Remember when I told you about Jodi Picoult's literary masterpiece, My Sister's Keeper?  I told you how phenomenal it was and how it impacted me deeply because the story hit too close to home?  The story resonated with me day and night, and I was counting down the days until its matching movie would be released - Friday, June 26th.  I told you how scared I was about the movie doing the book injustice, how it had to be impossible to maintain the emotion Jodi Picoult so passionately crafted, to maintain the pulse of each character's struggle to fight through their family's battle with cancer.

Well, I completely, randomly stumbled upon two advanced-screening tickets to the movie, so Jonathan and I went up to a Cleveland theater last night, braved the crowds and media and police officers, and saw "my movie" a few days early.  Now mind you, we are not VIP people.  I am your average-girl-next-door who dates an average-web-designer-guy, and we live average lives full of things that are not even in the neighborhood of scoring advanced movie passes, not to mention advanced movie passes to my movie.  Crazy, crazy...

But enough about that...

A little refresher?

Brian and Sara Fitzgerald have two beautiful children, Jesse and Kate.  When Kate, their baby, comes down with a rare form of leukemia, they exhaust their options to save her.  All but one, that is.  So stopping at nothing, Brian and Sara, through in vitro fertilization, conceive a child to be an exact bone marrow match for Kate.  At birth, Anna's cord is immediately taken to treat Kate.  But the line is not drawn there.   As Kate continues to go in and out of disease and remission, Anna is always there to share blood or cells or whatever Kate medically needs.  After all, she is a perfect genetic match for her older sister - she was created just for that purpose.  Brian and Sara seem to lose sight of anything but Kate, helping Kate get better, curing Kate.  When Kate is hospitalized, Anna is usually right there too, undergoing surgeries, procedures, and needles to help her sister get better.  Meanwhile?  Their family is breaking at the seams. Tension abounds. Jesse is left to fend for himself.  Anna is sure she's invisible.  Finally, at the age of 13 - for reasons you will be shocked to hear - Anna decides to sue her parents for the rights to her own body.  Kate needs a kidney, and there, Anna has to draw the line.

In the movie, the characters are so believable that you feel like you are joining the family.  Cameron Diaz gets to play the intricate Sara, and I think her fiercely determined performance - as well as Jason Patric's objective and tender Brian - was spot-on.  Abigail Breslin did a powerful and convincing rendition of Anna, and Sofia Vassilieva will surprise you at the strength, passion and courage she lends to her character, cancer-stricken Kate.  All of these characters will gently move you, challenge your beliefs, and teach you what life could be like if cancer hit your child, your sister, yourself as a young girl.

I was honestly scared that the movie would be a forged, fumbled mess of a story trying to follow such a sacred, breathtaking novel, but I was pleasantly surprised.  With a few intelligent changes and story twists, the film was basically a lighter, more concise, direct form of the book.  Where the book used descriptive words and beautiful explanations, the film used talented actors who subtly added shouting emotion to their roles, leaving you jarred with the heaviness of the elements and the touching capacity of the story's gentle tenderness.

Somethin' in your eyes, makes me wanna lose myself
Makes me wanna lose myself, in your arms
There's somethin' in your voice, makes my heart beat fast
Hope this feeling lasts, the rest of my life

If you knew how lonely my life has been
And how long I've been so alone
And if you knew how I wanted someone to come along
And change my life the way you've done

It feels like home to me, it feels like home to me
It feels like I'm all the way back where I come from
It feels like home to me, it feels like home to me
It feels like I'm all the way back where I belong

A window breaks, down a long, dark street
And a siren wails in the night
But I'm alright, 'cause I have you here with me
And I can almost see, through the dark there is light

Well, if you knew how much this moment means to me
And how long I've waited for your touch
And if you knew how happy you are making me
I never thought that I'd love anyone so much

It feels like home to me, it feels like home to me
It feels like I'm all the way the back where I come from
It feels like home to me, it feels like home to me
It feels like I'm all the way back where I belong

My Sister's Keeper, the movie, was done by Nick Cassavetes, director of tearjerkers the Notebook and Walk to Remember.  The Notebook worked because of its timeless love story and charming chemistry, and Walk to Remember worked because of its feel-good story and its role of anchoring the sappy storyline debut in a my generation's teen film genre.  My Sister's Keeper, however, worked because of Picoult's mastery, an amazing cast, and the fearlessness of accurate portrayals.  Cancer wasn't made out to be the quiet disease it isn't.  There were nosebleeds, bruises, dry lips, incontinence, and vomiting of blood.  There was yelling and screaming.  A soon-ending life wasn't made out to be a fairy tale with Walk to Remember underscores.  There were pursuits, tears, promises, and passion.  When it's the end, there's no time for wishing this or that happened, being frustrated you never whatever or whatever.  The movie recognizes this.

I've been at many of these places in my life, and I didn't realize until halfway through the movie that my jaw was clenched with my teeth digging into my left index finger.  Jonathan has taken the time to become a part of my history and to understand so much about my past struggles that after the film, he admitted to me that he had to distance himself at many points.  I also called my mom and told her under no circumstance was she to see this movie - if the bone marrow scene didn't get to her (she heard me screaming during mine and subsequently spent the time throwing up in the bathroom), then surely another scene would - perhaps where the doctor diagnoses toddler Kate with leukemia or where teenage Kate uses all of her strength to comfort her grieving mom.   If you recognize something in your life being similar to the storyline, I'm going to warn you that it will be hard to watch, but if you're willing to face the disgusting injustice of childhood cancer and see how it really impacts a family, this is a must-see film.

I'm so glad that the destruction of an ill child's battle was not painted eternally-sunny like a Disney movie or even cheesy and trying-too-hard like a Lifetime Movie.  Accurately, Cameron Diaz's relentless fight became weary and almost automatic.  Being a child shoved from dress-up and play dates into cold hospitals and illness was portrayed realistically - kicking and screaming before a procedure, a bone marrow aspiration scene in which a large needle drills into a thick hipbone of a tiny girl, and parents confronting the unimaginable... and at the point of an adolescent, having one too many painful days until enough is enough and you just want it all to end, be it by a mouthful of drugs or some other means.  Whether you'd like to admit it or not, these scenes are nothing but reality to the lives of many families all over the world.  This movie is accurate, and it's hard to watch, yes.  But, like I said, I believe this is a must-see film.  The world needs to get a glimpse into the world of what life could be like and to in turn be grateful for each day of health, each day of life, each day of sunshine.  I hope Jodi Picoult got a ton of money from selling her story to Warner Brothers, but most of all, I hope she is proud of how the book to movie transition was orchestrated, and I hope she gains lots of new readers as a result.  I hope her fresh, haunting, all-too-realistic story shakes lives and humbles its viewers.

Be brave and go see this movie.  Peek into the lives of too many people on this planet.  Hug your children and be thankful for their health.  Live your life with passion and without regrets.

I realize then that we never have children, we receive them.  And sometimes it's not for quite as long as we would have expected or hoped.  But it is still far better than never having had those children at all.  

She pushes back from me, until she can look me in the eye.  "Don't be," she says fiercely.  "Because I 'm not."  She tries to smile, tries so damn hard.  "It was a good one, Mom, wasn't it?"

I bite my lip, feel the heaviness of tears.  "It was the best," I answer.

          Kate, p395