The Prince of Tides - a study in Psychology
Joseph de Maistre, the celebrated French lawyer of seventeenth century, known for his defense of Monarchy during the revolution captured the essence of psychoanalysis succinctly when he wrote: “I do not know what the heart of a rascal may be; I know what is in the heart of an honest man; it is horrible”. This is precisely the predicament of Human personality. The façade does not always reveal the inner self. A thousand conflicting desires, feelings, thoughts and emotions flit though our little brain; and all that we present to the world outside is a balancing act. Fortunately, we are held in check by barbed wires of moral codes, ethics, education and an inherited discipline, otherwise, the chaos inside can jeopardize ones sanity and integrity in the world outside.
The year 1991 was a fascinating one for the Academy awards. There were two movies, based on two bestsellers, vying for top honors. Both of them based on psychological turmoil and palpitations of modern man in his complex relationship with the world around him. Both were written, directed, acted and cinematographed with great depth, flair and sensitivity. Both of them deserved to win accolades, but it always remain an irony that there could be only one indisputable winner, and the other had to be content knowing that it lost to a better adaption and an incredible performance by its lead actor. The loser that year was Barbara Streisand’s wonderful adaption of Pat Conroy’s “The prince of Tides”; and it lost to “The silence of the lambs”. Anthony Hopkin’s numbing performance as Dr Hannibal Lector left nobody else with a chance in the race. I have read Pat Conroy’s book many years ago, and I remember closing it with a feeling of satisfaction. The life of a school teacher bought up in a dysfunctional and abused childhood; with parents alienating themselves from each other and from their children; bereft of appreciation and genuine love – grows up to have a family of his own, carrying the discontent into his life; unable to touch the warm chords of marital bliss, repressing, wallowing in self-pity over his predicament – thus pushing his marriage and fatherhood to the brink of disaster. Fortunately, he is called to New York to attend to his sister recovering for an attempted suicide, and there meets her psychiatrist (played by Barbara Streisand herself...) In a series of events and beautifully structured emotional layers, our school teacher (Nick Nolte) slowly melts down, gets to face his demons and allow the thwarted waves of anger find empathy and physical comfort in this lady doctor and her troubled life; slowly the inner wheels of his psyche get oiled and lubricated enough, integrating back with his family - now as an understanding Husband and a loving father.
This story is in stark contrast to Thomas Harris’s psychologically depraved Hannibal Lector. Here, the brilliant doctor carries his schizophrenic delusions to a perversion unimaginable and grotesque. In both the books, it is a question of psychic adjustment to values, morals and codes of reasonable decency in the world around. One of the prices we pay for evolution is the ordering and managing of our inner selves. No other species faces this problem. They are all genetically wired with appropriate responses that fit stimuli, and there is no emotional baggage to carry beyond what is required for survival. But Man, needs to grow not merely physically to maturity, but also nurture, develop and protect the person that he has been bought up to be. The barriers of moral codes, ethics and laws are to keep this elusive entity called personality in check, and have him act and live within certain acceptable perimeters of society. A civilization is possible only when there are such restraints and balances, otherwise not. The industrial era displaced man from his community, family and value systems that governed him for ages. And with that seminal shift in inner balance, the onus of protecting and adapting himself to the need of living in groups became quite a challenge. Though abundance in twentieth century has freed significant number of us from physical needs; inner void and alienation deepened; and to alleviate and bridge this gap, we have a proliferation of Psychologists, psychoanalysts and spiritualists, who aspire to fuse the splintered individual to the demands of a group. In fact I would go as far as to say that the last five hundred years of History is nothing but this effort to reconcile an individual to society.
Well coming back to my movies: Here then are two contrasting films about Human psyche and its possibilities. Pat Conroy finds solace in the fact that it is possible to live harmoniously in society, once we muster the courage to open ourselves and look within; face the seething demons within, exorcise them and return with a renewed resolve and energy. Thomas Harris, on the other hand presents an antithetic case of a psyche lost in its extremities; completely impervious and insensitive to world outside; woefully cocooned in its own madness, self-aggrandizement and fulfillment; and would go any distance to emphasize the perverse eccentricity of the individual - Dr Hannibal Lector is an extreme symbol of our species gone wrong and maladjusted.
I has always had a fondness for Barbara Streisand. Though many find her very stereotyped and pretentious; she, in my opinion, has a knack of picking the right roles and stories. Nick Nolte as Tom Wingo - the southerner, with a wry sense of humor and sarcasm plays the repressed husband well enough. Music by James Newton Howard is gentle as usual and provides a wonderful backdrop to this drama. Finally, this movie is a gentle reminder that life need not always be lived backwards and in neuroses. We can learn from it and move on. That perhaps is the best way to remain sane, integrated and to find joy within oneself.
God bless...
The year 1991 was a fascinating one for the Academy awards. There were two movies, based on two bestsellers, vying for top honors. Both of them based on psychological turmoil and palpitations of modern man in his complex relationship with the world around him. Both were written, directed, acted and cinematographed with great depth, flair and sensitivity. Both of them deserved to win accolades, but it always remain an irony that there could be only one indisputable winner, and the other had to be content knowing that it lost to a better adaption and an incredible performance by its lead actor. The loser that year was Barbara Streisand’s wonderful adaption of Pat Conroy’s “The prince of Tides”; and it lost to “The silence of the lambs”. Anthony Hopkin’s numbing performance as Dr Hannibal Lector left nobody else with a chance in the race. I have read Pat Conroy’s book many years ago, and I remember closing it with a feeling of satisfaction. The life of a school teacher bought up in a dysfunctional and abused childhood; with parents alienating themselves from each other and from their children; bereft of appreciation and genuine love – grows up to have a family of his own, carrying the discontent into his life; unable to touch the warm chords of marital bliss, repressing, wallowing in self-pity over his predicament – thus pushing his marriage and fatherhood to the brink of disaster. Fortunately, he is called to New York to attend to his sister recovering for an attempted suicide, and there meets her psychiatrist (played by Barbara Streisand herself...) In a series of events and beautifully structured emotional layers, our school teacher (Nick Nolte) slowly melts down, gets to face his demons and allow the thwarted waves of anger find empathy and physical comfort in this lady doctor and her troubled life; slowly the inner wheels of his psyche get oiled and lubricated enough, integrating back with his family - now as an understanding Husband and a loving father.
This story is in stark contrast to Thomas Harris’s psychologically depraved Hannibal Lector. Here, the brilliant doctor carries his schizophrenic delusions to a perversion unimaginable and grotesque. In both the books, it is a question of psychic adjustment to values, morals and codes of reasonable decency in the world around. One of the prices we pay for evolution is the ordering and managing of our inner selves. No other species faces this problem. They are all genetically wired with appropriate responses that fit stimuli, and there is no emotional baggage to carry beyond what is required for survival. But Man, needs to grow not merely physically to maturity, but also nurture, develop and protect the person that he has been bought up to be. The barriers of moral codes, ethics and laws are to keep this elusive entity called personality in check, and have him act and live within certain acceptable perimeters of society. A civilization is possible only when there are such restraints and balances, otherwise not. The industrial era displaced man from his community, family and value systems that governed him for ages. And with that seminal shift in inner balance, the onus of protecting and adapting himself to the need of living in groups became quite a challenge. Though abundance in twentieth century has freed significant number of us from physical needs; inner void and alienation deepened; and to alleviate and bridge this gap, we have a proliferation of Psychologists, psychoanalysts and spiritualists, who aspire to fuse the splintered individual to the demands of a group. In fact I would go as far as to say that the last five hundred years of History is nothing but this effort to reconcile an individual to society.
Well coming back to my movies: Here then are two contrasting films about Human psyche and its possibilities. Pat Conroy finds solace in the fact that it is possible to live harmoniously in society, once we muster the courage to open ourselves and look within; face the seething demons within, exorcise them and return with a renewed resolve and energy. Thomas Harris, on the other hand presents an antithetic case of a psyche lost in its extremities; completely impervious and insensitive to world outside; woefully cocooned in its own madness, self-aggrandizement and fulfillment; and would go any distance to emphasize the perverse eccentricity of the individual - Dr Hannibal Lector is an extreme symbol of our species gone wrong and maladjusted.
I has always had a fondness for Barbara Streisand. Though many find her very stereotyped and pretentious; she, in my opinion, has a knack of picking the right roles and stories. Nick Nolte as Tom Wingo - the southerner, with a wry sense of humor and sarcasm plays the repressed husband well enough. Music by James Newton Howard is gentle as usual and provides a wonderful backdrop to this drama. Finally, this movie is a gentle reminder that life need not always be lived backwards and in neuroses. We can learn from it and move on. That perhaps is the best way to remain sane, integrated and to find joy within oneself.
God bless...
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