These movies are about finding freedom from your past. The first is about a divorcee who moves to Italy and buys and house, fixes it up, etc. all the while working out her pain from her divorce. The second is about a navy man who ends up in counselling over his anger. His challenge is to work through an abusive, parentless childhood and to ultimately reconnect with his lost family. He had to face the abusers, tell them he is alive and strong, and ask the mother who abandoned him why she did it. The first movie takes us on a pathway to freedom that involves letting go and letting things happen. The second movie take us on a pathway to freedom that involves retelling, and then ultimately reconnecting. The first character needs to rediscover her life in a new setting, the second character needs to go back and rediscover his life in its original setting. The redemptive meaning of the stories is expressed in two opposite directions.
This is what growth and freedom are about: finding the balance and the wisdom between letting go and holding on; knowing what to hold onto more than anything else, and knowing what to let go of.
A free-spirited character in the first movie said, “Live life spherically, in all directions.” The same character also said, “Keeping your childlike innocence is more important than anything else.”
