Forgetfulness - Sept 6 2026

 

Forgetfulness

Sept 6 2026

I am rewatching.

Seem to have forgotten

the plot, the point, the ending.

The main character

is vaguely familiar

yet somehow different still.

Nevertheless, my time’s not wasted;

the film’s more subtle than I thought, more layered

and I noticed more.

Seemed longer, as well.

Did I even see it before?

If I rewatched everything,

had my first day at school, first kiss again,

fell in and out of love

just as I once did

would it feel like living life over

not knowing how it ends?

Just how much did I forget

and where’d it all go?

I watched all the way

through the closing credits

including catering and best boy.

Turned up the sound 

because the music was good. 

But sat in my seat

as if immobilized

staring unfocused on the screen,

wondering

about forgetfulness

and where my memory went,

how much time was wasted

or if it ever is.

I occasionally indulge in rewatching good movies. Feel vaguely guilty, because there’s so much new stuff out there and so much I’ve missed. And there’s always that persistent thought niggling away:  am I so forgetful that nothing I ever did really matters, that it’s all wasted time? After all, if I could watch a movie again as if it was the first time, could I rerun my life as if I’d never lived it?  It’s this thought that pointed the poem in the direction it ended up taking. 

(Yet, invariably, rewatching a great movie is rarely a waste of time or lost opportunity:  they’re pretty much always just as good, if not better. Because I’m less preoccupied with plot, I notice more. Because I’m older and a more experienced viewer, I watch with a far more critical and appreciative eye. I’ve learned to have more appreciation for the choices the various artists and craftsmen have made — from camera work and set design, to dialogue and editing. How the story unfolds. What a remarkable difference good acting makes.

And anyway, most movies these days are terrible:  comic books and superheroes, big-tent lowest common denominator genre films, boringly predictable action flicks that depend on sensation, dumb comedies. Good adult movies are rare:  naturalistic dramas that make the viewer invest, attend, and think. Movies you can’t stop mentally and emotionally revisiting for days.)

FYI (and mine as well!):   Best boy refers to the assistant to the key grip or to the gaffer, depending on whether the credit is “best boy grip” or “best boy electric”. A gaffer is the chief lighting electrician on a film or TV set, responsible for the electrical crew and the lighting setup. The job of a key grip is to handle camera support and rigging, work with the gaffer and director of photography, and make sure equipment like dollies, cranes, flags, and other non-electrical gear is set up safely and effectively.