Woody Allen on Life & Death
What does one of the most prolific movie directors of our time think about life? In a career as a director and actor spanning decades, Woody Allen has had his share of success and controversy. In a recent interview about his latest film “You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger,” Allen was asked his views on life:
“I have a very grim, pessimistic view of it [life]. I always have since I was a little boy. It hasn’t gotten worse with age or anything. I do feel that it’s a grim, painful, nightmarish, meaningless experience, and the only way you can be happy is if you . . . deceive yourself.” (National Post)
Although the author of the article describes Allen’s take on life as “frank, philosophical and funny,” I’m hard-pressed to find much that is funny about it.
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It is perhaps somewhat ironic that a celebrity who seemingly has had it all would have such a depressing view of life. Yet Allen, who “famously said he wants to achieve immortality not through his work but by not dying,” noted that “My relationship with death remains the same. I’m strongly against it.” So although life, according to him, is grim, painful, nightmarish, and meaningless, it apparently still beats the alternative.
Although he claims to see no point in life, he nevertheless admits a yearning of some sort for immortality. Is it possible that these desires, these cravings for meaning and purpose, are not accidents, but actually serve to point us toward greatness that goes beyond the grim, painful, nightmarish, meaningless experience that Allen describes?
In author Erwin McManus’ book Soul Cravings, he describes how three interwoven cravings (for intimacy, meaning, and destiny) are shared by all human beings, and what these things tell us about this life and how to live it to its fullest. Choose which of the three resonates most with you to watch a short video on the topic: Intimacy Meaning Destiny
Do you share Woody Allen’s outlook on life? Are you willing to “deceive yourself” in order to find happiness, or is there a way to accept the truth of the world and yet find the meaning that seems to elude him? I hope that Mr Allen hasn’t yet given up his search for meaning and destiny, and that you haven’t either. If you’d like to talk to someone about it privately, please let us know via email.
Image source: Wikipedia Commons
In New York Times interview Sept 14, 2010, Woody was asked which seemed more plausible to him, “that we’ve existed in past lives, or that there is a God? He answered, “Neither seems plausible to me. . . I just feel, what you see is what you get.” With regard to any religious expression at all, he said, “I don’t follow it. I wish I could get with it. It would be a big help on those dark nights.” I wish I could tell him, that his “dark nights” are the result of choosing a destiny of “loneliness, isolation, and despair” separated from the God of eternity. I prefer to join those who are satisfying their craving for “intimacy, meaning, and destiny” in a personal relationship with our loving and forgiving God who has promised us a future full of sun-filled days of love and joy with loving friends.