Every once in a while a movie comes along that doesn't just entertain, it makes you think about the future. Such is "Can You Ever Forgive Me?"
This is not a film that's going to appeal to everyone, to be sure. Melissa McCarthy plays against type as Lee Israel, noted celebrity biographer whose work falls out of step with literary style in the early 90's. With the help of her ne'er do well friend, Jack Hock (Richard E. Grant), she sells forged letters from past literary greats to collectors to pay her bills.
The movie is based on a true story, written by the author Lee Israel herself. At moments the movie is hilarious and at moments it's very funny. Anyone who has had to struggle with bills will understand the need to do whatever it takes to make money. Anyone with a creative mind will feel a connection with Lee as she fights the urge to just give up writing for good while at the same time finding an outlet, no matter how criminal, for that creativity.
Ultimately, by Hollywood standards, this movie was not a great success, even with its Oscar nominations. But that's not why I found it interesting and not why I think it's a movie worth checking out.
We as writers and authors do what we do to make our mark and be remembered. Our books, our stories are concrete evidence that we were here, we did something.
But in an age of computers and deleted files and emails, and digital downloads, will that be enough?
The magic about the era of Dorothy Parks, Noel Coward, F. Scott Fitzgerald and the like is their paper trail. They didn't just write books. They didn't just create music and poetry. They lived on paper. They wrote actual letters. They signed things. They kept their early manuscripts because they couldn't just hit the DELETE button.
And these things, these letters, these early manuscripts, these physical books with signatures in them...these are the things people keep. They hold on to the physical items with an author's name on it. They pass bits of paper, envelops, napkins with scribbled notes on them from generation to generation, framed, under glass, a forever reminder that this author once was...
Our generation has automated. We've made it easier to publish, to distribute, to get our stories in front of people, and that's just fine. It's great, in fact, for those of us who are storytellers. We're telling stories. No worries.
But what is our legacy? There will be few, if any written letters saved and framed in a collector's shop. (I doubt my thank you notes from my high school graduation count.) Without these physical tokens of our personal lives, will people look back and say, "Ah, the wit of Sarah Bradley..."
I'm not sure they will.
And that makes me a little sad.
But that said, the movie is a solid bit of entertainment, especially if you are a writer. I give it three and a half stars.
