Last night I stayed up late to watch “Grace is Gone.” I have to say, it’s been awhile since a film touched me so very deeply.
John Cusack brilliantly portrays Stanley Phillips, a man who wanted to serve in the military so badly, he cheated on the vision test so he could get into the Army. When his doctor on base discovers that his eyesight is terrible, he kicks Stanley out, but Stanley has already met Grace, a beautiful cadet, and they are married. They have two daughters, Heidi and Dawn, and they’ve built a life together. When Grace is called up to serve in Iraq, Stanley is proud of her and teaches his daughters to exhibit that same kind of pride, but deep down, he feels jealous that his wife gets to go and not him.
When word comes that Grace has been killed, everything in Stanley’s world comes crashing to a halt. He doesn’t know what to think or feel, or how to react. Worst of all, he now has to tell his daughters that their mother is dead. He tries to tell them, but the words won’t come. Instead, he decides to take them on a spontaneous trip to the Enchanted Gardens, an amusement park several days’ journey away. This trip is so spontaneous, they don’t even pack – they just leave.
We go with them on their journey and we see Stanley’s attempts to create some wonderful memories for his daughters. He wants to fill them up with joy to give them something to cling to when he eventually breaks the news. Along the way, they stop at his mother’s house where he talks things over with his brother John, who doesn’t believe in the War and has no problems with sharing his views in front of the girls. One of the finest moments in the film is when Stanley says, and I paraphrase, “Their mother is overseas risking her life every day so you will have the right to sit there and say whatever you want.” The moment is even more emotionally charged because Grace has already given her life for John’s freedom of speech, and in that scene, Stanley is the only one who knows.
This film doesn’t go into the whole debate over whether the War is right or wrong. Politics don’t come into play. The movie focuses on the family, on the fact that real men and women are fighting for us, and that they are heroes. I love the talk Stanley has with his daughter when he tells her that the soldiers are doing their duty because they believe in it. When she says, “What if I don’t believe in it?” he replies, “Then we’re all lost.”
I came away from this movie so impacted, so ready to hunt down a soldier and thank them from the bottom of my heart for being willing to fight for my freedom.
This film is rated PG-13 for two uses of the “f” word and a scene toward the front where the women in Stanley’s support group for military spouses are discussing their last minutes with their husbands before they left. While I don’t necessarily applaud content such as this, I felt that these moments added to the reality of the situations shown and I didn’t find them gratuitous at all.
There are times when I feel honored to have had the opportunity to watch a certain movie. This was most definitely one of those times.
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