This past Sunday, I faced a cousin to the infamous ‘blue screen of death’ – a ‘black screen of death’, if you will. Pity, because the movie was living up to the hype my friends had given it. A blackout hit the mall where my family was watching The Greatest Showman. Looking back, I can’t say it was completely unexpected; a brief interruption in audio, when Philip Carlyle and Anne Wheeler encountered Mr. and Mrs. Carlyle at the theatre, foreshadowed the show-stopping blackout.
Perhaps fittingly, the blackout happened immediately after Ms. Lind and Mr. Barnum had their falling out. My dad joked that the unscheduled end of the movie aptly portrayed the ‘ruin’ the two characters had just talked about on-screen.
The ensuing wait became a fascinating study in human behaviour and psychology for me. Little rectangular screens lit up around me as moviegoers plunged back into the virtual world. Then, the dissatisfied murmuring began. “TGV…I paid 17 dollars for this bulls**t?”, a young man behind me grumbled. As I waited, still hoping for the movie to continue, I started thinking about that statement. As paying customers, we all had the right to be frustrated at the situation, but something seemed ironically amiss. Earlier in the movie, we had watched a young Phineas reduced to an orphan forced to steal to feed himself. Here we were, seated comfortably in a movie theatre, financially capable of spending nearly a day’s grocery money on entertainment, and we were grumbling about our condition? We had been inconvenienced, but in perspective, was it really something worth venting about? Had we not just watched The Greatest Showman address issues of true poverty, mistreatment, and thankfulness?
I’m still looking forward to finishing the movie and writing a complete review. Thus far, I love the aesthetics in the movie, and the deep emotional connection I found with the circus freaks and with Barnum’s family. I thought Hugh Jackman sold the charisma of Phineas T. Barnum, but the ‘freaks’ truly stole the show. The raw and relatable desire to belong, in tandem with the soaring music, left me teary-eyed through ‘This Is Me’. I will mention two sequences that stuck with me for their technical and emotional eloquence. The “Million Dreams” sequence in the abandoned house with Phineas and Charity as children stuck with me because of the innocence of the children and the literal foreshadowing of Barnum’s Circus. I also loved the ‘shadow dancing’ sequence that took place when Mr. and Mrs. Barnum were separated during the opera tour. It evoked the earlier roof dancing sequence, then poignantly emphasized Mrs. Barnum’s feeling of separation from her husband through the disappearance of the male silhouette.
That sense of separation is one I’ve come to empathize with over the last three years. Going through culture shock when I left my biological and church family in Malaysia to study in America, then experiencing reverse culture shock when I had to leave my American friends and church family, has been a growing experience for me. Mrs. Barnum’s statement rings true: you don’t need everyone to love you, just a few good people. I thank God to have found good friends that I can call family in NewSong, the Genevans choir (special shout-out to Matt and Madeleine and Tenor Equality!), Geneva theatre, Geneva history and humanities departments, Geneva Crossroads, Beaver Falls Christian Assembly, and Geneva friends in general who don’t fall into any of those categories but that still invested time and energy into me. Your love and friendship means more than I can ever fully say, but I’ll keep trying 😊
I do wish I had gotten to watch the entire movie at the first sitting; the build-up of the tension and the emotional investment won’t be quite the same. Still, I look forward to rejoining the circus for the rest of their show. They have already reminded me of truths about friendship and thankfulness, and given me an encouraging pat on my back about working toward your dreams.
Maybe it wasn’t a ‘black screen of death’, but an intermission…
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Jarrett, after reading this I want to run right out and see this film. I was already looking forward to hearing the music. My 8 year old granddaughter announced to me that she will “teach her children and her grandchildren” the songs from this movie. You’re a good writer. Keep doing it!
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