Review: Old Fashioned #oldfashionedmovie

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I am probably too medicated to have been able to cry at all the right parts in the indie film "Old Fashioned." Oh, don't say that, they will say. Don't cop to your being medicated. That doesn't reflect well on Christianity. You should be able to pray away all your depression and anxiety....

I know I run a risk in reviewing a film that is Christian-themed. I might align myself with the more-righteous-than-thou who decry my meds. I might also align myself with the fanwagoners who try to pack the theaters when any faith-based film projects onto a silver screen.

The cool thing about Old Fashioned, which several of my colleagues helped to direct and produce, is that it is a film that is so counter-cultural, it is effectively without niche. It is not a Kirk Cameron morality tale. It is not a saccharine rom-com with Nicholas Sparks-caliber lines.

Old Fashioned is, on the surface, a sweet romantic tale about a born-again believer man who has grown a tad curmudgeonly in his set apart ways, and the attractive tenant who moves in above his antique store. The romance spools slowly and sweetly. As each character unpacks his and her personal histories, we see their fine lines and their friction.

But Old Fashioned is also about a larger love story. The film is an allegory for the Gospel, about how a perfect God came to offer a perfect love in a broken world. There are moments in Old Fashioned, whose lighting is perfect and whose soundwork is really strong, that crystallize perfectly the way divine grace is offered freely, and how we reject it and fail to offer it to each other in the form of forgiveness.

Old Fashioned is not a perfect movie. At times the script felt a little uneven to me.  Sometimes scenes where body language and facial expressions were totally winning felt a little squandered because the dialogue bordered on the preachy. But it is a good film with solid performances and a wonderful message for the righteous, the proud, the hypocritical, dastardly, wicked and vain. And even the overly medicated.

Seven feet of invisible snow in New England

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The snow was so high and stiffly packed that winter; it was impossible to trudge home from the train without collecting snowflake souvenirs in my boots every night. It was my first full year of living in Boston and the winter was kicking my tail. The sun was still setting at some obscenely early hour, and I was a desk jockey pulling long hours for little pay, so I basically never saw the sun or my boyfriend or my friends. Color me depressed. I remember looking up and seeing a sign posted on a telephone pole that someone had Sharpied in black:

I'LL PAY YOU $10 TO DIG OUT MY CAR

I remember thinking how much would be reasonable to charge for someone to dig me out of my McJob life, to be perfectly dramatic.

*** My Boston comrades are still digging out of seven feet of snow. As is their trolley/subway system. New Englanders are bandying about phrases like "ice dam" which should only ever refer to a slip-n'-slide for penguins in the Arctic Circle. Their cabin fevers are spiking to epic highs. I mean--have you SEEN it up there? The whole situation is terribly unfair.

*** We agree, you and I, don't we? That the Nor-easters that keep dumping more snow on an already bewildered geography really smack of injustice and horror? We see the pictures of (or we experience firsthand) the shoveling and the roof-clearing and the endless headaches of commuting and we all are very much of one accord: That's painful stuff. Nobody deserves that. I'm really sorry.

I'm guessing that neighborliness increases in these times, too. There's a sort of camaraderie to picking up the shovels and knowing we're all in this Us v. Winter thing together.

But we all know that eventually winter ends. The snow melts. The swan boats emerge in the Public Gardens once more. The solution to the winter problem is the reliability of the earth orbiting as it should around the sun.

*** I have to remind myself that the private pains people carry are very much like the seven feet of snow, only invisible. I have friends dealing with diabetes, cancer, the grief of losing a parent. I have students who are hungry, lonely, hyper-anxious. My husband treats clients whose secrets could ruin lives--are ruining lives. They are buried under heavy blankets of snow. The meteorologists can't forecast what's ahead. They are not sure when this winter will end.

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I've lived through my share of winters, literal and figurative, and the invisible winters are always harder to weather.  Friends, if you need someone to help you dig out, I hope someone you trust can be there. If you call me, I'll probably send you links to cat videos on Youtube, but at least you'll know you are loved and you can keep the $10.

5 things the #H20challenge taught me

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1. I strived to drink 70 oz. of water every day for 30 days, eliminating caffeine and soda. It turns out that 70 oz. is totally possible and once I started drinking more water, I wanted more water.

2. I have the power to break my addiction from caffeine. I have never gone more than a 14 days without caffeine since at least 2007, maybe earlier. The first 2 weeks were most difficult (see also: headaches like woah, moody pants all day, foggy brain) but the more water I drank, the better I felt. Coffee is now something I can enjoy but don't need. Woop.

3. I started this because I have never been a good sleeper and my iron is often low and it turns out, less caffeine, more protein can remedy a whole bunch of maladies in my life. Funny thing, that. Fringe benefits: leaner waistline, no coffee spills on my clothes.

4. Accountability is so clutch. All my peeps who joined me chugging the h20--you made the difference. I didn't want to fall off the wagon because I knew you were cheering for me or running the race with me.

5. I think the dark circles under my eyes faded a bit, don't you? Please just nod your head and hand me that latte, won't you?

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