koko & everything else

koko & everything else

Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Les Miserables, Ironically Inspired Me


The “miserable ones” ironically inspired me. No, I don’t think I can ever pull off singing the songs even though I try to rehearse while taking a shower. And no, I don’t think I can ever be as passionate and as hopeful like the characters Jean Valjean or Marius Pontmercy.

But one thing that made me inspired that somehow, I felt better about life. I know it is fiction and somehow exaggerated (I cannot really expect such events would literally happen in my life) but that’s the point of fiction right? It gives us the power to translate the story and relate it to our own.

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And that’s what I did. I understand how “miserable” it was for Jean that his past follows him wherever he goes. That’s something I see in real life! No matter how hard we try to close some chapters in our lives, life blows a furious wind to bring us back to the previous pages. It’s an agonizing reality and even though we know it is already something in the past, the consequences still linger in our present and worse, in the future.
Then somehow we try to change “our identity” and turn our back from it. But it will keep haunting us to the point that we end up at a crossroad: should we go on and just leave everything behind (saving you’re a** with the possibility of hurting someone) OR go the Jean-way of facing the past and go through the painful reality (and still hurt someone in the process but with a clear conscience).

Of course, Jean will always be the ideal hero who will always do the right thing. But in life, do we really choose that path?

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Then there goes Eponine who loves Marius so dearly, yet allowed to be the bridge that will unite Marius and Cosette. That’s martyrdom and masochism at its finest. Is it even realistic? Entertainingly, YES! Let’s admit the fact that once in our lives, we really gave in to our emotions (just because we are in love) and hurt ourselves in the process. To others, that’s real love… but for me, that’s the worst kind. If you love someone and he/she doesn’t love you back, that’s painful enough as it is. But to allow that person to use you to be with someone else is just stup**. But hey, I was once an “Eponine” as everyone else was (or still is).

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But the most inspiring of all would be Javert. For some reason he was obsessively searching and hunting Jean, at first because he had so much respect with the law. But then throughout the story, he was in fact hunting Jean as if that’s the only meaning to his life. He became obsessed and infatuated with the idea of finally arresting him; and somehow nothing else mattered: that became his sole purpose in life. And what happened at the end? When Jean chose not to take his revenge, he was able to touch something inside Javert which made him pass up on the opportunity of a lifetime when he had Jean cornered. With that, he lost his purpose and his life ended up meaningless: ergo he killed himself by jumping off a bridge.

In real life, we process the same way. We hunt for the things we want in life: things we want to accomplish, things we want to buy and all sorts of crazy crap of life. But take away the wealth, the power and fame; what else do you have to keep you breathing? If there’s none, then we are all Javert in our own way. That really struck me hard. If I don’t have this, and I don’t have that, what is left of me? That’s something I contemplated with. That’s deep, right?

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Well, aside from the realization-crap I shared, Les Miserables will definitely be one of my all-time favorite movies. And yes, I am even considering getting an original DVD and soundtrack of it. It’s literature, it’s art and it’s culture combined. Victor Hugo was a great writer, and Les Miserables was a fine musical on stage… Les Miserables, in film, really gave justice to them all.

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