Caring a Lot About Justice
I’ve rarely been as shocked by a film as I was by the Netflix original I Care A Lot. I had no advance knowledge of the subject matter, but I watched it with my wife as it was to be a discussion topic at a movie club we recently joined. SPOILER WARNINGS are in effect here as it would otherwise be impossible to discuss some aspects of the film.
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It started with a rather unusual and surprising reaction to the pair of women who act as the quasi-protagonists. In the film, the two women conspire with unethical doctors and care facility administrators to legally take custody of elderly victims over the desperate objections of loving family members and bilk them out of their property and life savings. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older and have been thinking a lot about retirement strategies lately, but I had a surprisingly visceral reaction to this. It was truly impressive how quickly the film was able to turn my heart toward exquisite, unchristian hatred, and the desire to see bodily harm inflicted. This could only have been achieved with a brilliant performance by lead actress Rosamund Pike as Marla Grayson, who employed the perfect notes of arrogance and joy at the prospect of personal gain at the expense of innocent families.
Her schemes cause her to run afoul of Russian mob boss Roman Lunyov (Peter Dinklage) when she unknowingly targets his aging mother as her next victim. The film then proceeds to invert the common tropes of sympathetic characters on the run and hiding from murderous organized criminals. In this instance I was anxiously hoping against hope for the gangsters to successfully track the pair of women and subject both of them to torture and a painful demise. Sometimes we root against the protagonist because of problems with the film or casting, or something that the filmmakers could not have foreseen, that just rubs us the wrong way about the actors or their portrayal of the characters. This feels more like a response that the characters were designed to provoke by the actors and writer/director J Blakeson, and it makes one very self-reflective.
As a Christian I’m meant to always believe in and desire the redemption of wrongdoers, and the preservation of life to that end. My immediate emotional reaction to Marla’s crimes reveals a potential flaw in the Christ-like love that I’m to have for humanity, but in my defense, part of me was surely appealing to the notion of just and Holy retribution of which God is the ultimate arbiter and enforcer. It is right to be outraged by terrible crimes and to desire justice. The promise of justice is one of my favorite things about belief in God. In the inevitable confrontation between Marla and Roman, as he is threatening her life, she seems unconcerned at the prospect of dying, saying that she won’t know or care about anything after she is dead. This is an honest expression of a materialistic worldview; this loss of justice observed by Marla-haters, and one that few atheists get around to acknowledging openly. If there is no afterlife, and more importantly, no God, then the most horrific crimes can be committed, and as long as the perpetrator avoids human punishment, or merely faces a quick death, they essentially “get away with it”. Anyone with a sense of justice bristles at the notion that justice could be so denied, but again, it is a logical conclusion of atheistic materialism. On the other hand, the Christian worldview promises that wrongdoers, aside from any earthly punishment, will one day assuredly face perfect Divine justice. It’s only a movie, but I could have comforted myself with that thought rather than wishing the slow dismemberment of Marla and her partner.
There were flaws in the film and some plot points that stretched credulity, but you have to give credit to a work of fiction that inspires such self-examination concerning one’s theology and notions of justice. FINAL SPOILER: Marla is killed in the end by a family member of one of her victims who has died in her custody, and I have to give my wife credit for pointing out the reason the ending of the film is not entirely satisfying. In the time of COVID-19, one of the great moral outrages (one of many) concerns patients who die in isolation apart from their loving family members and friends. Marla dies in the arms of a loved one; a comfort that her victim was denied. As Christians we are assured that such injustices will ultimately and inevitably be rectified.
