As the marketing budgets for movies about alien invasions, Nordic gods and talking cars grow exponentially bigger, they increasingly tend to define our notions of what cinema is or could be. This has resulted in a generation or two out there who see little reason to go to a movie about, well, people. The complaint one usually hears from this crowd about such films is that "nothing happens."
Of course, this judgement is being passed down largely by dudes for whom saving the universe from evil alien robots counts as "something," whereas the myriad emotions, questions, desires and struggles that make up our lives all add up to "nothing." Yes, cinema can be about spectacular worlds of the imagination, but we should resist the notion — trumpeted by emotionally stunted fanboys and their panderers — that real life is not worth examining.
Just take a look at "Rabbit Hole," the new film by John Cameron Mitchell ("Hedwig and the Angry Inch"), which has Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart as a couple, Becca and Howie Corbett, whose marriage is falling apart due to their ongoing grief and guilt over the death of their child. Sounds like a real bummer, right? Well, yes and no. "Rabbit Hole" is an expansive film, full of sadness, but also warmth, humor, anger and — not least — a bit of wisdom.