You wanna be a what?
Friday, March 2, 2007 at 10:21AM 
I have read voraciously all my life - starting with Dr. Seuss and moving to William Steig and Norton Juster.
Junior High was all about Sci-Fi - notably Philip K. Dick. High School was a bit of everything, including this new guy I had heard of, John Irving ("The World According to Garp" was a book above me, but dazzling). College was all Vonnegut all the time. Toward the end I started reading Hemingway (I was a late bloomer).
But as much as I loved it all, I didn't think of being a writer until two things happened. At 22, I read Catcher in the Rye (again, late bloomer). Then a while later, (okay maybe 10 years later) I saw the movie Smoke (based on Paul Auster's work). I looked at IMDB and couldn't believe Smoke came out in 1995 - memory is funny like that. I thought I read Salinger's book and saw Auster's movie shortly after.
Nonetheless, I came home from Smoke stunned, and I couldn't quite say why. I came across this review of the movie.
SMOKE is a beautiful movie about nothing at all and at the same time about everything. I don´t even know how to describe it to someone, I guess it´s indescribable. It´s one of those rare movies that it has to be felt. If you don´t feel it, then you are missing the whole point. SMOKE is one of those rare movies which we don´t know how to recommend this to our friends, because it´s so original and simple that there is nothing to describe. Anything we might say ,it only will give the illusion this is an shallow or boring movie. SMOKE is not an adventure, not a drama, not a comedy, not a cops movie, not an action movie, so what it´s about ?!! It´s about life. But in a real way, and surprisingly not boring.
"It's about life" - maybe that is what struck me.
I clearly remember how a huge beam of light went off in my head. I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to write about life. As I read that, it seems slightly pretentious, yet there it is.
In 2005, Zoetrope reprinted Auster's story, "Auggie Wren's Christmas" - Smoke was based on this story. I wondered if I would get that same shivery feeling reading it. I read the story and I was stunned - I shook at the depth of the emotion. And when I synopsized the story for my wife, I was on the edge of tears until the end, I just needed to weep. And I did. There is something within that story that reaches deep inside me. That is a goal of mine, to write a story that can have that effect on a reader, even years later.
Reader Comments (2)
If I remember correctly, Smoke had the bags in trees. To this day, I notice the many plastic bags clinging to tree branches, which I never would have seen without the movie's prodding.
I also remember an extended shot of fallen leaves blowing in a circular motion -- they were trapped by a wind current up against a brick building.
Hi there - thanks for comment!
I believe you are talking about the movie, American Beauty - or that's the scene I remember vividly, with the leaves and the bags. It's another favortie of mine.
I watched Smoke again on the weekend and delighted in that whole last scene where Harvey Keitel, as Auggie, basically tells the Christmas story verbatim.