Inside Jokes, racial matters and hallowed ground.

I came a across a gem created for the Metro-Golwyn-Meyer. It features Robert Duvall and James Earl Jones (A family thing) and deals with the broad theme of Racial Relations between African Americans and Caucasians.

The two protagonists are driven into a historical but inward journey of self-discovery in which they are forced to confront their definitions of family and identity.

If there is any message for me in this particular work is that there are some issues in American Culture that are too sensitive to expose and that must be kept in the closest of sacred memories in which only The eyes of former masters and slaves can behold. The danger in our current age and in the American Experience is that unclean shoes have been allowed to tread on the sacred ground of American History. The result of this has been the disruption of Black-white relations and the interruption of decades of progress and reconciliation.

It's like a two man dance that has been ruined by a third overly enthusiastic party.

Without ruining the plot of the movie, the story is about a man who grows up in the south but must confront his past (and travel to the north) in order to rediscover himself in a racially charged southern part of America.

I see elements of this form of interruption when new nations and formed and the floodgates of progress ruin the process by which citizens can get to know each other and appreciate the birth of their new nation.
The wheels of progress often ruin the brief period of marination that must take place within the nation to create an inner sense before interaction, trade and commerce and commence with the outside world.

In my view the story is therefore about movement and change, it is about secrets and their power over us. It is about fresh and newer definitions of what it means to be a family.