Changed For the Better

      The other night I watched the movie "Millions" on TV. For anyone who hasn't seen it, it is a story about two British boys (Anthony-9 and Damian-7) and their father, their mother has just died and they have moved to a new house. Anthony seems to have his feet rooted very firmly in reality but Damian has hallucinations of various saints who help him work through the issues in his life. By chance, Damian ends up with a duffel bag full of stolen cash, which Anthony helps him manage. From the beginning, I saw Damian as a somewhat troubled boy struggling to cope with the death of his mother. In one scene Anthony very harshly echoes this sentiment by proclaiming that Damian "is a loony" and that he ought to be "locked up" because he has serious conversations with visions seen by no one but himself. Towards the end of the movie, Damian has a vision of his dead mother; she comforts him and reveals that although Anthony pretends to be fine, he is just as lost and grief-ridden as Damian. At this point I realized that while I had noticed that Damian might be a little bit crazy because of his hallucinations, I hadn't really thought that much about Anthony. Throughout the whole movie Anthony is obsessed with real estate investment, government taxes, and currency exchange rates. This behavior is just as unusual for a nine year old boy as hallucinations. Yet when I viewed the movie years ago (before AP English) I never looked very deeply at his character. This time around I found myself much more observant, I was able to see a deeper message about insanity and how it is judged. Anthony is just as crazy as Damian, but to the casual observer (myself before AP English) Damian comes across as the "loony" while Anthony just comes across as pragmatic beyond his years. As an AP English student (read "compulsive analyzer") I can see that my first judgment of the two brothers was superficial. I saw Damian as crazy because his behavior has no place in society, and Anthony as fairly normal because his behavior does have an acceptable place in society, just not in his age group. Perhaps not everyone thinks this way, but I think a lot of people must, because the same thing happens in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Some people are judged insane and locked up, while others (like the sadistic Nurse Ratched and her "black boys") are judged normal and allowed to preside over the insane when they are just as disturbed as them. Clearly, it is important to avoid superficial judgment and to look beyond the surface of a person's character. Luckily, AP English has strengthened my powers of observation and analysis and I can hopefully be more insightful in the future.



A Saint from one of Damian's visions

Damian and Anthony with the duffel bag of cash