2018. 109 minutes. Rated PG.
“The only thing faster than light is the darkness.”
Let me start out by saying one thing: spoilers.
Spoilers, spoilers, spoilers.
A Wrinkle in Time is a visual extravaganza. Centered on the Murray siblings’ (Storm Reid as Meg, Deric McCabe as Charles Wallace) interstellar search for their father (Chris Pine), it’s well directed, visually stunning, and features a fun cast. (Though Oprah did sort of hog the spotlight as Mrs. Which. More Mindy Kaling!) I loved its diversity, its style, its bright colors. I loved its child actors, who did an extraordinary job with what must have been challenging roles. I loved the book back when I was into spiritual science fiction. (The film changes the focus from spirituality to psychological health.)
But I did not like this movie. And the reasons that I did not like it have to do with its underlying message, which seems to be that you can and should kill your depression.
So, I promised you spoilers. Obvs, spoilers. This is the last time I’ll say it. SPOILERS.
When I watched WiT, I couldn’t help but notice how Charles Wallace spoke to Meg and Calvin (Levi Miller) when he was under It’s influence. The way he broke them down emotionally mirrors the shitty little voice that follows you around when you’re depressed. This fucking voice takes your best qualities and twists them into humiliating parodies of your worst fears. Your desire to help others becomes elitism and hubris. Your desire for community becomes sniveling, weak-minded, and desperate. It’s like living with Regina George in your head. Charles Wallace channels this voice while standing in the midst of what appear to be huge, blackened, diseased neurons. Meg eventually turns those neurons into light by loving herself and demanding love from others, thus slaying her depression forever. Uplifting, right?
At first glimpse, yeah. But look a little closer. Think back to your last bout with depression. Whether you have one every ten years or every ten days, you probably remember one thing about it over all else: it sticks. You can “talk back” all you want, but that won’t necessarily make it leave any faster.
This neurons-to-light metaphor put me in mind of people who, when they find you still sitting on the couch staring into space after six hours, say, “you’re just not trying hard enough to be happy.” My friends, I have a radical idea for you: it is not your damn fault if you come down with clinical depression. It didn’t happen because you do not have enough love for the universe (or yourself) in your heart. Depression is a matter of the chemicals in your brain. Being a super-good and super-positive anti-darkness warrior queen is not going to save you from it because your agency is minimal.
WiT leans hard toward Meg having clinical depression. The neuron imagery, her lack of balance in the Happy Medium’s (Zach Galifianakis) cave, and the sheer length of time she’s spent depressed about her dad’s absence (people do get over losing a parent) suggest that there’s more going on than just a traumatic life event.
The myth of depression banishment is rooted in the idea that chronic sadness comes from iniquities in your soul. “Good” people don’t suffer from it because they’re connected to their light, or their god, or their diet, or whatever. Thus, culpability for depression falls squarely on the shoulders of the depressed person. If only you were more full of light! If only you would open yourself to the words of Jesus Christ! If only you went vegan! YOU can control whether you get depressed, which is often how someone else communicates that they really, really, REALLY hope they never end up like you. This film presents the idea that you can fix yourself if you try hard enough. And if you don’t make it, well, too bad; clearly you want to be broken.
It begs a question I have long pondered: Are we only good people as long as we’re happy? Or does happiness just make us nice people, neat people, convenient people?
I’m not sure. There’s a pronounced dark side to the cult of positivity. I don’t mean to suggest that joy and mercy and forgiveness and love are inherently toxic. But when your dad takes off to see the universe days after your family adopts a son, then immediately abandons that son again because the son turns out to be a handful, should your first reaction be to hug that dad and say “I love you?”
If I were to see that in real life, I’d be concerned.
Let’s back up. The first conversation in the film occurs between Meg and her parents (Pine and Gugu Mbatha-Raw), where they reassure her over the adoption of her new brother, Charles Wallace. But was Meg really the one who needed reassurance here? Dad Murray blitzes right after that, and though he ostensibly gets lost in space, he demonstrates later in the film that he can still tesser from inside Kamazotz. In fact, he proves this by cutting and running when his son–the son who, I suspect, he was not entirely sanguine about–needs the kind of exorcism that only love can provide.
Even if we were being generous here, Dad Murray’s reaction demands just a bit of processing. After four years of isolation and torture, I guess I can understand if his instinct is to take off. However, I don’t think we should ignore the possibility that he either doesn’t love or actively dreads being a father to his son. Charles Wallace’s appearance always precedes Murray’s ability and willingness to tesser. The fact that Meg, a smart girl who is excellent at questioning the status quo, doesn’t pick up on this bothered me immensely. Has her fear of It caused her to shy away from critical, possibly negative thinking about her dad? If fear is a negative emotion, and therefore part of It, is her fear of It somehow being inspired directly by It? Can It make you anxious about your status of being in the light? Is this all an elaborate It-directed mind game?
The film’s conclusion is insanely fraught. If any point in the film were a good time for some productive negativity, it would be this one. But nobody processes. Nobody questions. Instead, we get an abrupt “happy” ending. Everything’s OK as long as we accept that everything turned out right. But if it didn’t, and if questions remain, then isn’t that false positive worse?
The ambiguous brand of light and happiness that the Misses peddle implies an unquestioning acceptance of a good outcome, regardless of potential problems. I’m reminded of the kind of uncomplicated obedience and martyrousness that I associate most often with abusive relationships. In fact, the way that Calvin says he’ll address his father’s abuse at the end of the film made me wonder if his life is really going to get better as a result of his newfound enlightenment. Think about it. Calvin, the abused child, is going to confront his abusive adult father? The film would have us believe that Calvin’s going to change his dad with the power of love, that Calvin’s dad was only a monster because of It. If I’m going to buy that, then I want to see a follow-up film where incidents of domestic abuse plummet worldwide after Dad Murray’s return.
If It isn’t 100% responsible for all abuse worldwide, then the metaphor is all screwy. I understand what the film’s trying for, but I’m just not sure I like what it has to say about victimhood.
I went into A Wrinkle in Time planning to like it. I envisioned a day when I’d have a child of my own, a family book club where we’d read L’Engle’s Wrinkle and then see the movie together. Now, I’m not sure I’d show any kid this film. It lacks the book’s subtlety around some very sensitive issues. Plus, in redirecting the original spiritual message to a psychological one, it turns a lot of what L’Engle accomplished into borderline nonsense. It sucks to be this disappointed. Then again, as a critic, my ability to understand a film’s merits depends on the existence of useful negativity.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LRhcadlX8c]
