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The Moviegoer

The time and setting of The Moviegoer show the meaninglessness of affluence the south post-war through the lives of Binx and Kate. While Binx appears to be a stock-broker who happily lives an ordinary existence in Gentilly, he really is unhappy with his life and contemplates “the possibility of a search…. the search is what anyone would undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life” (p.7). Binx Bolling is searching for the meaning of life or at least a purpose for his. While he observes life through the movies he enjoys and watches frequently, he is afraid of change in his own life because of his fear of malaise- “the pain of loss” (p.107). He is also scared of things staying the same “Only once in my life was the grip of everydayness broken: when I lay bleeding in a ditch” (p.127).

He dates his secretaries, but he has no real emotional ties to them, only lust. Kate is the only person that genuinely sees inside of Binx’s false exterior because she and he think the same. Kate sees Binx as the man he really is instead of the person his Aunt and others want him to be.  Kate, like Binx, is only happy when there is a crisis, and there is no “everydayness.” They both complete and complement each other’s lives

He loves and marries Kate because he needs to feel needed, to have a purpose. Kate wants to be told who she is and what to do so she agrees to marry Binx if he agrees to this, she “wants to believe in someone completely” (p.173). When Binx tells Kate, “Everything is going to be all right,” it indicates Binx will face it all, good and bad, together with Kate.

I can certainly understand Binx’s boredom of the everydayness and his search for the meaning or purpose of life. It hit me at thirty and then again at 50. For anyone who has not yet had the experience, I can only describe it as something that eats at you continuously. I felt like something inside me would die if I didn’t change my life, although things were good, and I should have been content. I see it as a good motivator, at least for me it was after the indecisiveness and fear subsided. I quit a job that I had for 22 years and started college. One of my worries, Like Binx, was of disappointing others. Another was what if I don’t succeed? On the other side, what if I fly?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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