Tropic Sprockets / The World According to Garp

By Ian Brockway

George Roy Hill (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid) directs the eccentric and daring classic “The World According to Garp.” [Showtimes and trailer at TropicCinema.com]  Thoughtful, quirky, and impactful, the film teases one’s expectations under the guise of a breezy 1980s era film.

Garp (Robin Williams) is a young man raised by his feminist single mother Jenny (Glenn Close). His father died in World War II, a father because he had a permanent erection.

Garp is prone to fantasy rhapsodizing with stories about his father who was a brave pilot. Garp wants to be a writer. He enjoys wrestling and is obsessed with death. He becomes almost Eastern in his mindset by savoring each moment. Garp is gentle and childlike, yet he can also be stubborn and driven.

Jenny is understandably close to her son and is somewhat prudish. She does not think the normal sexual progressions apply to Garp. Noticing that Garp is shy talking to a prostitute, Jenny is driven to talk to the prostitute herself to understand Garp’s tension and break him of it. He is horrified.

Garp retreats into his imagination, becoming enamored with the bookish Helen (Mary Beth Hurt). Garp and Helen are married. They have kids.

Meanwhile Garp’s mother becomes driven by politics. Her life is threatened and then some.

Before “Forrest Gump,” here is Garp, an unusual man, not quite masculine but not feminine. Garp driven by honor, romance, and emotional ideas. He is highly sentimental but quick to anger.

Garp has an almost sacred religious belief in nostalgia and takes fatherhood to heart.

Garp is almost Zen without Zen. Death always looms.

While half of the film is a Ray Bradbury meditation on the cycle of life, the film takes a macabre turn, tonally commenting on shootings and the death of John Lennon, given the inclusion of the Beatles song “When I’m Sixty-Four.”

The film co-stars John Lithgow as a trans woman friend of Garp. This is groundbreaking for its time because the role is not weighed down by camp or ridicule. Lithgow’s Roberta is a genuine person.

This film takes the feel-good quirk of an 80s film and spins it on its head. Strange, immersive, and concussive, one is never sure how this film will land. The poignance is laced with menace and danger. Spielbergian nostalgia turns into the darkness of Highsmith, but the source material is absolutely John Irving from his acclaimed novel.

This film highlights the talent of Robin Williams who handles his character from many angles: from angst to romance to an engine of volatility to a passive observer. Robin Williams is completely mercurial and mystical, earthy, and eerie and this is one of his best roles.

Write Ian at [email protected]

 

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