Time To Talk Movies Again.

So I had a bit of waiting time on one of the train stations on my way home yesterday again, so I hit the cd/dvd-store and found a charming little dvd that I bought, took home, and watched later that evening. It's the movie The Man Who Sued God and I'm gonna damn well discuss it now. Because I find a few things very amusing about the whole thing.

First of all, the concept is great. No, this isn't as stupid as the title sounds (although part of the movie *IS* about how stupid the concept sounds when formulated like that), this movie makes several really good points and is rather well-filmed, well-acted, etc., too. The movie stars Billy Connolly as a former attourney who decided on a fisherman lifestyle instead. Where this usually is the concept of a standard-formula, sappy Hollywood movie about coming to terms with what you want instead of abiding the career pressure society puts on us, that is actually WHERE THE MOVIE STARTS. The sappy Hollywood movie would end there, but we've all seen it before, so TMWSG starts off with Billy leaving his boat to go eat dinner with his ex-wife, with whom he still has a friendly relationship. A storm turns up as he does so, and a lightning bolt blows his boat into smithereens. He's not too bothered at first, because he's sure the insurance company will pay up. After all, why else do you have insurance if not to help you out financially in unforseen situations ?
Wrong. The company claims this falls in the category 'acts of God' which aren't covered. Needless to say, Billy's character, Steve Myers, doesn't leave it at that and tries to sue. Having been a lawyer before, he already knows it's kind of hopeless, until he sees another way - he could sue God. Rather, His representatives on this planet, so, the Church. After all, if God is responsible, as the insurance companies claim, He should pay up for his boat, which was still being paid off and was simultaneously his only means for making a living AND his home.
As with any good character piece in our Western culture, he's battling a major force, because the lawyers, the insurance companies, and the Church are all in bed with one another on this and happily take on this fool who tries to sue the Big Man. Myers then proceeds to play the media (aided by a reporter he initially, drunk as a lord, accidentally harassed in a restaurant before, but who's intrigued with what Myers is trying to do) and becomes a whole lot less of a fool in the public's eyes. So the case goes to court, and Myers kicks some ass with several very good points (and the case gradually becomes a class action sue) until the opponents start to fight dirty. They get the reporter fired, the ex-wife and her husband are suddenly denied the loan they're depending on, things are looking like Myers will be seperated from his daughter, the media are spinning the story the other way around again, displaying him and the reporter no longer as heroic noble people fighting the good cause but as con artists looking for a quick buck. The only way out to get some justice without losing face is a moral victory, which they end up getting. The cinematic tricks used in the movie were great, the story's written in a very mature and intelligent way, the humour - for this IS a comedy, although you can't tell too well most of the time - is witty and surprisingly well-dosed, with the exception of Connolly hardly any of the cast are top performers but the acting is so well that you quickly forget you've never seen these people before and you just get sucked into the story, the 'noble hero trick' card (as semi-explained in the movie The Majestic) is well-played, with an unexpected - though (undeservedly) online heavily criticised as flawed, poorly constructed, weak etc. - ending that put you back into reality, where big fights like these ARE faught but often settled, or they indeed (as proposed as an outcome in the story) will drag on for decades, and barely ever any good comes from it. The moral victory is convincing (I thought) and a great, realistic way out of a major dillemma - quit the fight and no justice is archieved, or win and come off as a greedy con artist.
I recommend watching this movie, if you're into actually GOOD STORIES which are well-filmed without too many standard Hollywood tricks to them. What's even more amusing to me - on top of all the good legal and theosophical and theological points that are being made, as well as the great main concept to begin with - is that Connolly, who in this movie plays a reasonably average downtrodden man from the streets fighting corrupt insurance companies to get one of their most profitable tricks out of their greedy hands, represents the major international banking/insurance company I work for in the commercials in Australia, the country where this movie was filmed and released. That's right - Connolly represents ING, in a set of advertisements stressing how easy and straightforward ING is to bank or insure with in those parts, and I could never see the point of it, since I only know Connolly as the hilarious but foulmouthed stand-up comedian he is in his shows as broadcasted by BBC. NOW it makes a lot more sense that he was recruited for that very marketing purpose - he's, in a way, still Steve Myers, and the marketing concept is that ING is nothing like those companies.
Well, I won't get into wether they are or aren't like that. All I know is that the ING's money I've wasted while writing this during office hours must've come from somewhere. Sorry, Billy. Or Steve. I can't tell if ING pulls any nasty legal tricks in insurance since I'm only a web designer and I know jack shit about the ING's *actual* services. But I'm pretty sure all bankers and insurers are about equally corrupt. Let's just leave it at that.