The Work (2017)
This whole process of going down into the wound is not an end in itself. We’re looking for something, and we’re bringing something back out of that descent. So listen for it in this poem. It comes right in the last line.
Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief
turning downward through its black water
to the place we cannot breathe
can never know the source from which we drink,
the secret water, cold and clear,
nor find in the darkness glimmering
the small round coins
thrown away by those who wished for something else.— David Whyte
The Work is a documentary you’ve probably never heard of, and one I discovered by chance —by accident— or perhaps, I believe, by providence. You can read an excellent article here for the particulars of the setup & details on the themes, but for me in this moment, still fresh from the experience, what I wanted to do was post the above poem & publish this on Facebook in the hopes that one of you will find it compelling enough to give The Work a shot. I don’t usually recommend films that moved me this overwhelmingly to everyone I know because it’s a risk. Recommending movies you love requires exposure, vulnerability, & an openness to criticism of something you found powerful. But that’s precisely the message of this documentary. By the end, you don’t want to cling onto your regular, tired fears. You want to figure out a way to break down the barriers until they have no place in your mentality anymore. Right there where we hurt the most is where the medicine is.
My friend Kraig recently told me that I often have a hard time talking or writing about movies “objectively” in the sense of being able to separate the film from my own personal feelings or my individual emotional experience of them. At first, my instinctive reaction was to say that (A) no one (no one!) can watch a movie objectively, and (B) there are several examples where I have been able to remove my reactions from my ultimate analysis or rating of the film.
However.
However. After watching The Work tonight & witnessing the fragile, raw humanity the men displayed — recognizing in myself similar insecurities, shortcomings, cycles of thinking — I realized that Kraig inadvertently cracked one of my codes. My favorite movies have this characteristic in common: I am changed. Divorcing the impact from the technical qualities of those films themselves is quite a task, & admittedly, one I have not genuinely tried. Thus, in the case of The Work, it will be on my Top 5 Best list at the end of 2018 not because it’s the “best” in terms of lighting or cinematography or script or editing or what have you. It is in the Best category because it reached my heart and affected me in a way I’ll remember, in a way that will translate to action I otherwise would not have set in motion. Sure, there are flaws, and absolutely, not all of you would enjoy this or like it nearly as much as I did. In fact, you may not like it at all.
… but for me, when a movie can deepen my heart, it’s beyond five stars. *
