4:55 p.m. - 2002-09-28
Serendipity
I bought the video "Shipping News" a while ago on impulse. It appealed to me because it is set in the easternmost province of Canada - Newfoundland and it was on sale. The story is about an upstate New Yorker who flees to his ancestral home after a tragedy, to rebuild a life for his daughter and himself. Now, Newfoundland's people are a paradox to most other Canadians. I thought this movie, based on a Pulitzer Prize novel and directed by Lasse Holleran, might shed a little light on their lives as the story develops.
Newfoundland is an island that was first settled in about 1000 AD by Norsemen whose ships had been blown off course during their travels. The island is very much like their homeland. Dramatic deep fjords, stark rocky coastlines, extraordinary natural beauty. A harsh,unforgiving land and sea where inner strength, faith, and absolute pragmatism are the only tools that make it possible to survive. Battles with the native populations (Beothuk and Mic Mac) finally destroyed the first western settlements. However, the Grand Banks were such a rich fishing ground that it wasn't long before the Europeans were battling over rights of access and ownership. By the late 1500's England ruled and the island was resettled by a mixture of the English, Scots, and Irish.
Isolation from the mainland has frozen this culture in time. An economy based solely on the sea has given the islanders a focus and values that are not easily understood by most other Canadians. Although Newfoundlanders are from the same ancestral stock as a good segment of the rest of Canadians they "are not like us". As with most societies, what isn't understood is often diminished or ridiculed. Newfoundlanders' adaptations and coping skills to the demands of their environment are the butt of many a joke across the country even while their strength, their work ethic, and faith are admired without question.
In the movie, Kevin Spacey's character is a beaten down man approaching middle age. Vignettes of compromises he makes in order to keep the shape of his life intact show how a promising human becomes one just living day to day. A series of deaths and the arrival on the scene of a long lost aunt at a pivotal moment in the string of tragedies has him traveling with her to start over again in Newfoundland.
In that one choice he surrenders the whole pattern of his life. Everything in his environment is new to him - the culture, his job, the physical circumstances he must deal with. He learns about boats and the sea. From being an ink-setter he becomes a reporter covering tragedies and the shipping news. His take on the sea, fishing, and boats is so unusual to the local inhabitants that his writing becomes very popular. As the story unfolds, he learns about the history of his ancestors and begins to understand the forces that molded his perception of himself.
Although this is very much a serious psychological portrait, I found I laughed through a good deal of the movie. The other reporters in the story initiate him both into the world of newspapers and into the the culture of Newfoundland with humour and compassion. A developing love story with the character of Julianne Moore forces him to explore his emotions and perceptions about "reality". His daughter's and aunt immersion into an almost mystical reconnection with ancient family roots opens a door for him to faith in the future. It is a story dominated by the serendipitous. It is a story of a community that knows at a gut level, because of their harsh environment, that each one depends on the other. It was a very good way to spend an afternoon.
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