FORREST GUMP, the monster 1994 hit, is handily described/adored/abhorred as a comedy-drama. It’s also a fictional bio, an epic-scaled yet intimate period piece, episodic magic realism in an Americana framework, and a showcase for smooth A-level craftsmanship on several levels; the different yet complimentary approaches merged with humor, heart and technological expertise. If nothing else, it’s an example of those Phenomenon Movies that show up from time to time. They can come out of rock bottom nowhere, like The Blair Witch Project. They might have a built-in following whipped up by breath-held expectation, taking the hill and holding it forever like Gone With The Wind. They can be rank cheese that mystifyingly pass the sniff-test beyond any logical expectation (Porky’s) or they might lightsaber old, presumably stale popcorn into expanding galaxies of cash (Star Wars). Everybody talks about it, sooner or later almost everyone sees it. Predictably, backlash follows, and it’s usually overdone. You can’t please ’em all, and some are constitutionally unable to ‘get’ or just plain unwilling to enjoy anything that brings happiness to somebody else, let alone a lot of somebodies. There is that proverb about those who can’t take a joke…

“I’m not a smart man… but I know what love is.”

Savannah, Georgia, 1981. Waiting for a bus, ‘Forrest Gump’ (Tom Hanks, 37) passes the time talking to several different strangers as they share the stop’s bench. They can tell he’s a little ‘different’ (his IQ is 75), but he’s pleasant and amiably chatty, even idly philosophical, as he tells them about passages in his life, from the early 1950’s as an only child in Alabama, thru high school and college (football scholarship ‘cuz he can run like a cheetah), combat in Vietnam, running a business (‘The Bubba Gump Shrimp Company‘), the memories of places and events laced with encounters with famous people. Thru the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s chance, circumstance and character have allowed him to turn afflictions and losses into strengths and successes. He had help, of course; we learn who provided it to him and what he did for them in return. Chocolates are mentioned.

“That boy sure is a runnin’ fool!”

Directed by Robert Zemeckis, Eric Roth’s screenplay was based on Winston Groom’s 1986 novel. Roth softened the book’s approach, which was darker, with 228 pages of adventures even more bizarre than the many in the screen version. While on location taking the $55,000,000 risk Hanks and Zemeckis wondered whether anyone would care about such an oddball story (the book had only sold 30,000 copies). When their 142 minute gamble arrived, most critical response was positive, even giddy, and the public showed up in invasion force numbers. After The Lion King, it was the year’s #2 hit, a grand slam in the home zone of $329,700,000, and even more internationally, $347,693,000. The book’s sales zoomed to over a million. The soundtrack—Alan Silvestri’s fine composing and a great pop tune selection—sold 12,000,000 copies. The Academy Awards went gonzo, handing wins for Best Picture, Actor (Hanks), Director, Screenplay, Film Editing and Visual Effects, with nominations for Supporting Actor (Gary Sinese), Cinematography, Music Score, Art Direction, Makeup, Sound and Sound Effects Editing.

“I believe he said he had to go pee.”

Hanks is always good, though I find Forrest a bit of a challenge, enjoying the movie around him more than the character: he’s excellent here, but he was better in Saving Private Ryan and Cast Away. The key supporting roles are done by Robin Wright, superb as the much-abused ‘Jenny Curran’, Forrest’s lifelong friend; Gary Sinese, splendid as the bitter, war-ravaged survivor ‘Lt. Dan Taylor’; Sally Field, dependably warm as Forrest’s mother; and Mykelti Williamson, amusing as ‘Nam comrade ‘Bubba Blue’, endlessly fascinated by shrimp. The interweaving of real-life personalities is a technical dazzler, going Zelig one better, the highlight an encounter with JFK. All in, a deft mix of period/s feeling, human absurdity & dignity, flaws & strengths; funny, touching and—as those who put it together hoped and intended—entertaining.

“Anyway, like I was sayin’, shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey’s uh, shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There’s pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. That- that’s about it.”

But…wait just a We Know Better minute! Wipe those smiles from your silly plebeian faces! Despite repeated insistence from the director, screenwriter, producers and performers—basically the people who would, uh, know—that the only ‘agenda’ was in telling an entertaining tale, their sincerity and insider insights about what they did & why were cavalierly brushed aside by the tireless and tiresome claimants to ‘Our’ Story. A rain-parade squall on one side (are there only two?) whined that it was a subversive betrayal—of critical decades in social history, of the handicapped, of the Left, of half the country, of Women, everything but the Grand Canyon and the Easter Bunny—disguised as a feel good/tearjerk but was actually a coded Fascism cake with a nougat & pop tune icing.  Pardon me while I take a hit a laughing, but ‘owning’ the friggin’ 60’s gets a little old, especially lectures about those ‘days of future passed’ from people whose parents were kids at the time. That sneerjob not enough, at the same time what Gump ‘said’ was noisily hijacked by self-serving hypocrites on the other side (of evolution) as a sort of inverted Battle Hymn Of The Republic(an) paean to values (their ‘Family’ brand) that are apparently only possessed by the ‘Right’, heavily armed, endlessly angry part of the population. No surprise: they’d push the same putsch with Star Wars, The Lord Of The Rings and Christmas, basically anything to the left of the Luftwaffe that they’re too dino-brained to grasp wasn’t extolling their Fox-led charge to the ultimate Little Big Horn but might actually be mocking them. What’re ya gonna do?  Same mob of dipshitwits who believe Tom Hanks drinks baby blood given to him by Hillary Clinton. Did their clear-cut logging of Forrest’s gumption prompt the bleats from the Birkenstock seats, or was it a mutual owngasm?  “Stupid is as stupid does.” *

LT. DAN: “Have you found Jesus yet, Gump?”   FORREST: “I didn’t know I was supposed to be looking for him, sir.”

Shot in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maine, Utah, Arizona, Montana and California. With Michael Conners Humphreys (8, young Forrest), Hanna R. Hall (9, young Jenny), Geoffrey Blake, Dick Cavett, Haley Joel Osment (5, feature debut), Siobhan Fallon Hogan and Michael Jace.

* Zemeckis: “We flipped the two elements of the book, making the love story primary and the fantastic adventures secondary. Also, the book was cynical and colder than the movie. In the movie, Gump is a completely decent character, always true to his word. He has no agenda and no opinion about anything except Jenny, his mother and God.”

Co-producer Steve Tisch: “All over the political map, people have been calling Forrest their own. But, Forrest Gump isn’t about politics or conservative values. It’s about humanity, it’s about respect, tolerance and unconditional love.”

“Life is Like…Whatever I Say” —when this became one of the movie ‘events’ of 1994 (with The Lion King for kiddies and Pulp Fiction for trendies) your host was in the midst of a six month travel epic, too absorbed by wonders to pay attention to post-cineplex spit-takes back in ‘civilization’. The authentic news that summer was the genocide in Rwanda, a ‘social event’ that even the Gump grousers might concede as more important than what a fantasy-comedy-drama “said” about “us”.  Americans make a big deal about anyone telling them how to live but they sure love telling other Americans what to think, thus ensuring that the haywire’d climate gets massive infusions of our own hot air. Two homegrown items did momentarily stagger me on that odyssey. First, the O.J. Simpson murder melodrama: beholding his car chase live on CNN, in a hostel in Dar es Salaam, thinking “Oh, wow, this show is going to ‘play’ forever”.  Second, the stunned reaction on hearing Elvis Presley’s daughter had married Michael Jackson, this toll for thee gleefully rung by a Brit trekker in a hut in the Himalayas: dazed, I almost wandered off to become a yogi. So Mark missed, mercifully, the whole “it really says this!” brouhaha over the movie. Saw it later, post-stampede, enjoyed it, let it go. Apologies for the indulgent blab: it’s about as ‘important’ as the bull slinging at & over Mr. Gump, even-handed observer to the quadruple-Mad World around him. “Run, Forrest! Run!”