It came to my attention, very recently, that there are people out there that share my admiration for the film "The Fountain", but there are also many comments from people that say they didn't like it, that they didn't understand it. It's possible that many people weren't amazed for it's lack of special effects, undressed actresses, etc. Although, Rachel Weisz is a treat all of her own, by the way, her beauty draws you passionately into the story.
This story is about love, the many times two souls shared in their short lives, fighting life's adversities, but always trying to be together. It offers a hope that life keeps on going in a cycle, the way spiritists (Kardecists) believe souls to cycle in repeating experiences for the soul's evolution.
I myself don't go to their extremes, but find God's interaction with humanity to have a purpose, one that could only be linked to our souls. Thus, a single life - the shortness, adversities and accidents - could not be compatible with the long time a soul may require to evolve. Clearly this is wishful thinking, but to believe there is a God, one must also believe there is a purpose to His work.
The movie may be interpreted as such, or it can simply be seen as creative writing from Rachel's character Izzi. In both cases, it would be a nice story. I strongly appreciated the film for the first possibility, that such a couple met long ago and were meant to be together, but circumstances prevented that, and they were given a second chance, and possibly more, until the last man (which was the original title of the movie) dies and is charged to accompany his true love, whose soul had been bound to a tree, to someplace where all souls converge in some distant star called "Shibalba" and are cast back again for a new and refreshing start.
It really doesn't matter where or what shibalba is, as long as you see it as a temporary place, to get back again to evolve some more. I'd also recommend watching Robbin Williams and Cuba Gooding Jr.'s film "What Dreams May Come", which also regards this matter, and is also a great film that touches the heart.
I don't think we can only have one try in life - for our soul's sake, that when we die we either go to a heaven or to hell, depending on what we do. This would be a very unjust system, especially to those that die young, or those with mental illnesses that are cheated of choice and understanding, or to those that are unfortunate to be born with idiot parents or in the wrong side of the world, where the "true" religions have never been able to dominate. In the impressively ignorant world we live in, heaven would be a very lonely place.
Worse, most religions claim to know it all, to possess God's given right to spread his messages, but in truth, every single believer is nothing more than a conformist follower, the appropriate path to fanatism. Very few people really try to reason with the overwhelming religious propaganda to truly have something of their own mind - which would be another path entirely, one of enlightment and reason.
So, to appreciate this film, which may be heresy to some modern religions, is to accept the possibility that we live cycles for the benefit of our souls.
On a personal level, these movies touched me deeply, because I saw myself, or rather my wishes, in the husband characters, in the sense that I had a wife, once, that I loved very much. I felt as if that love were ageless. But now that she is gone, I would like to believe that I will find her again, in another life, where we can once more love each other, maybe loose each other once more, only to find ourselves again and again...
