Just one more, honestly. This one so thoughtful I had to read it twice. A

reader:

“You are all wrong. What makes me an authority you ask? Am I an acclaimed

movie critic? No, I’m an actuary.

“‘About Schmidt’ is a great movie because it is about man’s search for

meaning and purpose in life, and the risk (actuarial concept) of hitching

your wagon to the wrong pony. Warren Schmidt tethered his fortunes to a life

philosophy known as ‘risk aversion.’ Play it safe and follow the formula

that has worked for billions of people for thousands of years: work hard,

get married, provide for your family, and follow the rules (i.e. don’t leave

work before the second hand hits 12) and everything will work out fine. Keep

your head down and don’t ask a lot of questions, and you will have a

meaningful life and a happy retirement.

“In this sense, ‘About Schmidt’ is a tragedy like ‘Death of a Sales Man’:

through no fault of his own, the standard formula didn’t work for Warren

Schmidt. (Fulfillment didn’t materialize, he experiences loneliness in

retirement because his wife died, he discovers a friend had betrayed him,

and he doesn’t have a loving relationship with his child). He finds that by

following this formula he didn’t live life, he merely went through the

motions in an attempt to ‘get through’ life. He got married, but he didn’t

work to create a fulfilling marriage. He had a child, but delegated the

active parenting role to his wife. This is why his daughter had the

personality of her mother (controlling complainer with low coping skills)

with the career ambitions of her father (deciding between bubble-wrap and

Styrofoam peanuts). The tragedy is that he realizes this lesson too late to

be a positive influence in a major step in his daughter’s life.

“The redeeming message is that it is never too late to find some meaning.

Sure, it’s too late to become an entrepreneur and have a meaningful career

by building a business, and it’s too late to raise his daughter, but it’s

not too late to save the life of Ndugu from an infection. Yes, he’s wasted a

lot of his potential, but by saving Ndugu’s life, his life was not

meaningless.

“Finally, the wedding toast was a call for tolerance and respect in other

people’s search for meaning. The father-in-law wants social status, the

mother-in-law personal connection (and sexual fulfillment), the son-in-law

wants basically the same thing as Warren Schmidt, but without all the hard

work. It’s said that nobody looks back upon their life from their deathbed

and says, ‘gee, I wish I would have put in more hours at the office.’ Will

the in-laws have regrets about wasted potential similar in magnitude to

Warren Schmidt when they retire? Who knows? But it seems hard to believe

that their regrets could be any worse.”

Like it or hate it, this is some movie. I can’t tell you how many essays it

has generated in my inbox, several of them of publishable quality. Any

pastor with half a brain should be able to get at least five sermons out of

ABOUT SCHMIDT. Some movie.