Garden State

Maybe I'm in a Jersey state of mind. I can't get this movie out of my head.

It was August when I walked into the theater nearest my place of residence to see the movie written and directed by JD (Zach Braff) from Scrubs. It wasn't just because I enjoy scrubs that I wanted to see this movie, I'd seen the trailers, and they fascinated me. They're cut like a dream and the music's haunting. I hoped the movie would live up to the expectation of the trailers.

And that's the problem with expectations, isn't it. They're hard to live up to.

I walked out of the theater, having enjoyed the film, a bit disappointed. I think I've said it before, but the endings to movies are what weigh most heavily in my mind, and I liked Garden State's ending better when Dustin Hoffman sat next to Katharine Ross on a bus, staring straight ahead, purposefully not looking at each other, a single question hanging in the air for the audience to snatch and think. It was nice that JD looked to one of the greatest film endings ever for his film, but, for me, it just didn't work as well. I didn't really feel the ending, which is strange, considering what the film's about.

On the surface, Garden State is about a boy going home. He sees the people who were once his friends. He sees his father. And he even falls in love. A bit deeper, it's about learning to feel again.

See, Andrew Largeman (JD's character in the film) is overly medicated. He takes lots of anti-depressants and he's been on them since he was young. The drugs have made him numb. Numb to feelings. Numb to desire. Numb to life. He lives in LA, but has to go home for his mother's funeral and decides to leave his pill 3000 miles away. His dad, who's also his psychiatrist, offers to get him more, but Andrew declines, he want's to know what it's like to be. And he starts to learn. It's obvious that the end is just the beginning.

Which is the way this movie got to me. A few days ago, the movie crept back into my brain. It started to dance around and tickle my neurons. At work, I constantly hummed songs from the soundtrack (which I now must own). The more I think about the film, the more I like it. The more I feel what happened before the ending and know that the ending isn't what matters, it's what led up to it. The same is true for Andrew, in the movie.

I have to go and see Garden State again. I have to own the soundtrack.

I think you do too.