As a boy, I thought the ideal life was being a low-level bureaucrat, doing as little work as possible and spending as little money as possible, until I would finally got a hand-shake and a pension. However, once I read my first Ian Fleming novel, bureaucracy lost its charm for me forever.
When my curiosity about existentialism began in Texas decades ago, I read about an obscure Japanese movie made in 1952 called Ikiru, (Japanese for "to live") about a low-level bureaucrat who learns he has terminal stomach cancer with only six months to live. He had been dutiful and thrifty all his life but was now dying anyway. Because the movie has been described as the greatest existential movie ever made, I went to the local video store (remember those?) and asked if they could order the movie for me. They just laughed.
Eleven years ago when I first found Amazon, I looked for the video again without success, except for a short book about it. Imagine my surprise when it just popped up on Amazon recently as recommended for me, based on previous purchases. Of course, I bought it, and it was a joy to watch that grainy, black & white old movie.
Two themes run through existentialism. One is the abundance of absurdity, and the other is man's obsession with death.
In this movie, we see the neighborhood mothers complaining about a cesspool that was making children sick. We see them being shuffled from agency to agency, from department to department, from bureaucrat to bureaucrat, with nothing being accomplished. You cannot miss absurdity of it.
Realizing the end of his drab,boring life is quickly approaching, he makes the mistake of many old fools and finds the innocent exuberance of young women irresistible, but only for a short time, before one tells him her exuberance comes from actually accomplishing something. With little time left, he commits himself to fighting his fellow bureaucrats and turning the neighborhood cesspool into a park for children.
After the dedication ceremony of the park, where he is not recognized for all his effort, he stays in the park, sitting on the children's swing as the snow falls. He froze to death that night, but a witness reported the old bureaucrat was singing softly as he lay dying in the snow.
The absurdity of excessive structure in life and the importance of doing something despite your impending death remind me of some Jimmy Buffet lyrics about "I'd rather die while I'm living . . . than live when I'm dead." The old bureaucrat in Ikiru didn't start living, really living . . . until he started dying.
When my curiosity about existentialism began in Texas decades ago, I read about an obscure Japanese movie made in 1952 called Ikiru, (Japanese for "to live") about a low-level bureaucrat who learns he has terminal stomach cancer with only six months to live. He had been dutiful and thrifty all his life but was now dying anyway. Because the movie has been described as the greatest existential movie ever made, I went to the local video store (remember those?) and asked if they could order the movie for me. They just laughed.
Eleven years ago when I first found Amazon, I looked for the video again without success, except for a short book about it. Imagine my surprise when it just popped up on Amazon recently as recommended for me, based on previous purchases. Of course, I bought it, and it was a joy to watch that grainy, black & white old movie.
Two themes run through existentialism. One is the abundance of absurdity, and the other is man's obsession with death.
In this movie, we see the neighborhood mothers complaining about a cesspool that was making children sick. We see them being shuffled from agency to agency, from department to department, from bureaucrat to bureaucrat, with nothing being accomplished. You cannot miss absurdity of it.
Realizing the end of his drab,boring life is quickly approaching, he makes the mistake of many old fools and finds the innocent exuberance of young women irresistible, but only for a short time, before one tells him her exuberance comes from actually accomplishing something. With little time left, he commits himself to fighting his fellow bureaucrats and turning the neighborhood cesspool into a park for children.
After the dedication ceremony of the park, where he is not recognized for all his effort, he stays in the park, sitting on the children's swing as the snow falls. He froze to death that night, but a witness reported the old bureaucrat was singing softly as he lay dying in the snow.
The absurdity of excessive structure in life and the importance of doing something despite your impending death remind me of some Jimmy Buffet lyrics about "I'd rather die while I'm living . . . than live when I'm dead." The old bureaucrat in Ikiru didn't start living, really living . . . until he started dying.
