Sunday, April 09, 2006

why is it my favorite show?

I wasn't interested in the tv show La Femme Nikita just for the suspended romance, the great modern plots and twists, etc. Not even so much because the lead was female. I started watching it in '97 till it ended in 2000, which bookended the times from before I left home until I got married. It had this amazing ability to capture the insane bondage and contradictory code-of-survival that I saw in my parental home life. It was a bondage that, when tested, proved greater and greater lows. Nikita, in the show, had the same fearlessness and passion and vision to be free and live life by her knowledge of reality. So there was that mix of cynicism and bitterness; feeling utterly alone and trapped. And, yet, no matter what they psychologically stripped from her, they could not take her hope nor her standard of morality and freedom.

The character of the man who trained her, Michael, embodied all the aspects of those hopes and frustrations. Deep down Michael was not only attracted to her but loved her, but he could not admit this for her safety or his. His vision for solutions was morally opposed to hers, or at least this is how each conflict began between them. She would see that, by the end of the episode, what she had assumed as inhumane deeds by his practices actually were moral in principle. Imagine that happening on a frequent basis, let alone just once! It turned her mind inside out. Another words, he had inhumane practical applications of his moral principles. She never could capture both aspects into the one man. She ended up getting hurt and surprised to discover either the inhumane or the moral. And the fact that he was a man of few words, made the "mystery" even harder to attempt. Meanwhile, people's lives were being determined to be saved or not, with each decision he made. This drove her crazy. She could barely contain her anger as she discovered his intention for evil, and then her anger would barely be diffused enough to walk away in the end after realizing the good or tolerable reason behind it.

This mental torment, was my young adult life. I could not find a leg to stand on at almost any time in my thinking about who I was, for why there was something morally missing or wrong with the life I currently led.

But that was just in regard to my ability to think. For when it came to my heart, I knew there was much, much more that life was supposed to be. And so I learned to hone in on my passionate feelings, and my emotions to what I was being forced to do, so that I could learn to build a mental framework for leaving one day.

Nikita was the sole voice of moraity and respect for life and love in the Section, and she was torn down for it. And even today in my family I am still the only one with a vision for what respect for life can look like.

  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/passion.wav


  • The tearing down:

  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/manipult.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/nofreedm.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/notkillr.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/humanity.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/freewill.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/nomore.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/protect.wav


  • And the vision she has for exercizing respect for life; challenging her oppressors to justify themselves:

  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase1/zoo.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/trial.wav


  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase3/value.wav


  • Her last words spoken in isolation, regarding losing her own life in standing up for what was right:

  • http://cusmus.tripod.com/phrase2/notfraid.wav


  • Am I obsessed? I don't know. Is it abnormal for me to procure quotes of an actress from a fiction tv show to express things that aren't exactly applicable to my life? Maybe. Do you understand why I did it, though??

    I did it because there is no other voice, no other story, no other set of scenarios and words said that are similar to my own. And part of the healing process is to ID what is taking place before your eyes. I have had to stand up for myself at a time when there was only me to explain, justify or condemn by my own conscience, what took place. Now, there is another story that depicts the struggle. The epiphanies Nikita has, have been like therapy for me.

    La Femme Nikita the tv show was based on two theatrical movies; the first called the same title, a French movie and yes you can find it here in the US, and then after that "Point of No Return" in the early 90's with Bridget Fonda, which you've probably seen playing on tv by now.

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