Profound is the Word! (SPOILERS)

So much content in such a short subject! This film affected me with almost the impact of the book and movie of Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451." What survives of "Day Dreams" from 1922 is viewable here http://www.dailymotion.com/vid...eams-1922_shortfilms

Buster Keaton plays a young man who asks for a young lady's hand in marriage. Her father (played here by Buster's real-life dad) asks, "How will you support her?" He answers, "I don't know. I'll go to the city. If I don't make good, I'll come back and shoot myself." Her father says, "Splendid, I'll lend you my revolver."

There follows a series of episodes in which he sends the girl letters describing his activities in positive terms which she elevates to glowing daydreams. The one that really got me was when he wrote, "I am cleaning up on Wall Street," and she pictures him as a big shot banker when he is literally a street sweeper. Geez, does that hit home. How much horse puckey would someone have to shovel now to clean up that place?

In the end after he has tried numerous ventures and has nothing but blisters to show for all his hard work, he admits defeat and has himself mailed to the girl. The father solemnly produces the revolver and he and his daughter go in the next room. Many of Buster's pictures are romantic and much of how they succeed lies in the appeal of the female lead. Right then I hated this girl. She didn't even try to prevent his shooting himself.) From the next room comes a blast and a cloud of smoke. Then Buster walks in saying, "I missed."

He ended up not being the one blown away, I was! Maybe pure self-preservation rather than the sort of statement being made by the occupy Wall Street movement now, but this is precisely how and why Bradbury's writing functions. No matter how fantastic, all of it is metaphors for very real life situations. Here in about twenty minutes I saw a summary of what I have been struggling with since age ten (before which I was too young to understand, or care) and seriously reassessing since the financial crisis became severe in 2008.

This hit really, really close to home for me since a classmate of mine committed suicide in 1992. Yes, it was by gun and the reasons were emotional, not financial. Since the moment that happened I knew suicide was not an option for me which put me in the precarious position of having to justify not shooting myself every minute, every hour, every day of the entire time since, including long stretches as a virtual hermit as I didn't want to have to justify myself the way the young man in this film is called upon to do. Actually, in real life it's my impression most people don't really want you to shoot yourself, they want you to either a) do impossible things in impossible situations or b) acknowledge your inferiority, subjugate yourself to their superiority, and learn to like it--assuming you can even accept it. The only thing worse than a humble genius who doesn't recognize their own worth, is someone who thinks they're a genius and isn't. Unfortunately those who can convince others they are smart, generally end up controlling those who actually are--which sadly happened in Buster's case.

If in 1972 a revelation comes that I have to prove myself to justify my existence, in 1992 a resolution that I'm not going to shoot myself just because I failed to impress certain people, then in 2011 a resolution comes that this "99%" now making all the noise are well justified.

Think about it. If these peoples' math is even marginally right and they took the old line that the old man in this film did (which the young man considered and rejected) and figured anyone in a free industrialized country who is not a financial success after several vigorous tries should just shoot themselves, and everyone who has lost a home, job, or property in the last three years DID go out and shoot themselves, and it was really 99% or anything like it, what would happen? The stupid 1% left wouldn't be able to run the world! Multiply that by other, non-industrialized countries where people have always been poor and you see where it leads--nobody left!

Here comes the punch in the gut akin to "Fahrenheit 451." All of society has stumbled along since well out of human memory with one idea which has worked fine for them, or so it seems. Then one day along comes the situation which sparks the concept which shows "everyone" to be wrong and a few misfit loners to be right. BAM. That is, when we go to shoot ourselves, we should ALL miss.

It flies in the face of what we are brought up to believe as Americans, but there it is, that different and frightening notion which makes all too much sense.

In a larger sense, this film makes a statement not just about the nature of capitalism and the American way but human nature in general. Certainly in hunter-gatherer societies, anyone unsuccessful as a hunter, gatherer, or one or two other accepted positions would end up marginalized at best, though they might possess traits which would make them successful in other societies. This works best, though, as a direct reflection of American values. Those with grandiose notions of better lives created and perpetuated America. It is all about keeping up with and surpassing the Joneses, starting in each person's own imagination, which makes this, in Bradbury's definition, a "science fiction" film--picturing the young lady's elaborate speculations, and quickly and effectively depicting their harsh clash with reality as lived by the young man.

In the end of the film when the fellow doesn't shoot himself, the girl's father throws him out the window. I felt like throwing the dumbbell girl out the window. She didn't even realize what she had.