"About Alex" is the latest Hollywood movie I saw and really liked. No coincidence that it is about stuff which I really care about, feel strongly about or have written about.
The movie is about this guy who tries to commit suicide and then later bails on it but calls upon his college friends to give him support. 5 friends (obviously with history with each other) reach his place and everyone reacts the way they know to without really realizing that almost all of that reactions are stemming from that past history. The movie hits upon themes of closet homosexuality, casual sex, immature relationships in college, abuse of prescription drugs, depression, fear of commitment, professional failure, jealousy apart from suicide and friendship which are obvious ones given the plot.
I could relate to pretty much everything (i know what you are thinking - barring that one!) in this movie and I kind of have gone through all this already in my life through one form or the other.
Casual Sex - I vehemently recommend it, it takes away all inhibition from life. It takes away your license to judge and liberates you from any high moral grounds that you may be subjected to. Coming from a small city like Chandigarh where exposure is low and the concept of sex is still very "you have to do it with the chosen one", I had all these bullsh%t fundas of sex being the most powerful force blah blah. Then I met someone who was exact opposite of me and I realized how constricting these fundas are!
Immature Relationships - well i am quite immature so all my relationships are by default immature too. But yeah college ones were definitely insanely childish and imbecilic. The obsession, the reactions, the drama, the tension, the pseudo "seriousness" - now that I think of was of utter nonsensical proportions.
Abuse of prescription drugs, depression - the less said about this, the better...i was asked to remove this part
Fear of commitment - everyone has it, who doesn't. Especially at young age, who wants to commit? rather who even knows what commitment is? As opposed to what women think, it is to keep options open, it is not. It is to keep a level of detachment, it is a means to keep a level of casualness to something which otherwise spirals into mind bending epic waste of time.
Professional Failure - hahaha...hahahhaa...this i am a champion of! OMG! Those people who have never gone through failure in job / career / studies can never understand the intensity of the feelings which emerge when you have sustained, continuous, never ending professional failure. And can never fathom what it does to one's psyche, one's confidence, one's perspective to life.
I am getting bored writing this post because it just brings back such useless memories which I have tried so hard to forget. Anyway this was a great movie, i will definitely watch it again sometime.
MA
