I just fell in love.
The object of my affection is the French film The Intouchables. It has just received the nomination to be my all-time favorite.
The Intouchables is not ostensibly about war and/or peace, but it pulsates with all the human strengths and frailties that can lead to war or peace. At the most simplistic and surface level, we could say that the film is about a rich quadriplegic and a black street-wise personal caretaker, but such a description totally fails to convey the gifts one can find in the film.
It is about race and class, difference and similarity, trust and mistrust, gains and losses, going forward and going back. It is about empathy and most transcendently, it is about love.
The power of the connection I felt with The Intouchables probably is linked in part to the story of one of the main characters, Philippe, who became a quadriplegic in an accident at age 42. Although his accident was far more serious than the one that left me paraplegic at age 25, he wouldn’t want to hear this. He wants no pity, which he associates with hopelessness; he wants life—and a new life is what he gained from his caretaker, Abdel Sallou. I can identify completely with these feelings.
The pervading theme in my favorite films is redemption, and The Intouchables is about redemption.
The power of that theme for me probably stems from my own personal failures through the years—and I remember some from when I was a pre-teen—failures in empathy, tolerance, kindness, and the like.
I imagine that in part it is my own need for redemption that led me into the fields of nonviolence, peace, reconciliation, and forgiveness. Whether you are looking for redemption or not, I recommend that you see The Intouchables. It is superb.
Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology
P.S. Help redeem America by visiting this site and viewing a preview of the dramatic and challenging documentary being made by a frequent contributor to this site–Ross Caputi, Iraq war anti-war veteran:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/570302124/fear-not-the-path-of-truth-a-fallujah-veterans-doc
and think about how you can help his project as well as engagingpeace.com