jack

yesterday one of my all time favorite childhood movies was on TBS.
watching it as a 20 year old, this movie still fascinates me, still make me laugh, and i still think the little boy (who is no longer little, in real life he is five years older) is still so so cute.
this movie came out when i was about 7 or 8 and i remember watching it not all that in tune with the message the movie was trying to get across to their viewers.
i remember watching it again and again, when i was 12, 13, 15, 16, 18 and now 20.
still thinking every time that the little boy is cute, wanting the tree house, and actually wanting to be a boy, because this movie is all about boyhood, how boys become friends, how they mature at a natural rate, and at a rate four times more then the average 10 year old.
this movie is, 'jack.'
an a-list movie with robin williams, diane lane, bill cosby, janis from friends, jennifer lopez, and all the little tykes that were in every kids movie of the 90's.
watching it last night, i watched it in a different light...literally, i only had the lamp on not the head light in the living room, but more philosophically, i watched how the kids wanted jack to come out to play and they would not leave him alone until he came out...he didn't come out, how a right of passage for these boys was to eat the most grotesque combination of worms, toothpaste, brownies, whip cream, relish, and whatever else a 10 year old would make another 10 year old eat, or louis...the little boy i still find cute wrote his essay on what he wants to be when he grows up, on who he wants to be when he grows up, "like my best friend, jack, because he is the perfect grown-up."
and then we get to the graduation ceremony seven years later. jack gave a speech that reflected what his tutor said to him when he was 10, 'you will never be normal, you are spectacular. have you ever seen a shooting star? they come quick, but they light up the entire sky, just for a moment."
jack said to his fellow classmates, 'look up at the stars and think of me, live your life, life goes quick, mainly for me, make it spectacular, i did."
and in just a simple little movie that promotes laughter, promotes acceptance to those who are different, and shows that 10 year olds are wiser then they seem, i left the living room thinking, have i made my life spectacular? not yet, but i had along with the other kids that jack didn't was time. when i am 28 years old, i will not have the body of a 112 year old, but that doesn't mean my life couldn't end up short.
i love going back to the movies that helped shape my childhood, because i always learn something new.