It seems to take a lifetime to let everything go

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is a film about a man who is aging in reverse. He is born with the metabolism, skin, cataracts, arthritis and relative vitality of a man in his late 80s. His life ends some 90 years later as a newborn.

I'm not sure I liked this movie. Not sure how eagerly I'll be recommending it. It's long. Slow in spots. Fragmented -- the subplots come and go, sometimes concurrently, but several of the roads don't lead to Rome. Some of the roads just come to a dead stop, or peter out in the middle of nowhere.

In some ways the movie is a 160-minute slice-of-life travelogue, albeit beautifully shot, well-written and well-acted. The makeup and period set designs and wardrobe are by themselves worth the price of admission.

I need a referral to a college professor of literature. See, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is a recrafting of a 1921 F. Scott Fitzgerald short story by the same name. And it's quite possible I just didn't get it. Me, a guy who really loves to be beguiled and provoked by evocative metaphors in art and literature; well, this one might well have been beyond me.

Is it about death? Mortality? Ageism? Fate? Or possibly that there's no such thing as fate? Perhaps the story ultimately forces us to face chaos. Perhaps it says that every day is but a toss of the existential dice. All the more reason, of course, to pay attention and give thanks for inexplicable moments of love, courage, beauty, character, truth and joy.

Perhaps the movie is saying that our existential crisis isn't about growing old. That the crisis would be identical if we were born old and were growing younger. Is that it? Do I get it?

In one scene, a gifted ballet dancer is struck by a car, leg shattered, surviving, but never to dance again. The narration goes to great pains to observe the scores of incidental, random absurdities that fall into place to make this accident happen ... as opposed to nearly happening, which is to say not happening at all.

I don't think I believe in fate. Yet, I am convinced there are moments rightly called destiny. I'm no longer even bothered by the contradiction.

But one subplot was, for me, worth every door that slammed shut in my coronary arteries under the onslaught of nearly three hours of movie theater popcorn butter.

The protagonist Benjamin meets his birth father. The father admits to being horrified by his son's "old man" appearance at birth. The father explains how he abandoned Benjamin to a benevolent caretaker of a home for the elderly. The father expresses remorse, regret and a wish to reconcile. And Benjamin is rightly offended and angry.

But then we see Benjamin caring for his father, who is now terminally ill. Benjamin walks his father to the grave in love, mercy and compassion, while we listen to his retrospective narrative explain why. He tells us that we can cry, scream, beat our fists, rail against the fates and circumstance and coincidence, wish our lot in life had been different, spend sleepless nights wondering why we didn't turn left instead of right ... "but when it all ends, we have to let it go."

When it all ends, we have to let it go.

It is often said of death that "you can't take it with you." We mean, of course, that material wealth is rendered irrelevant in death. We don't take bank accounts or MVP trophies or advanced academic degrees or Lexi (that's the plural of Lexus) or even so much as your seventh-grade perfect attendance certificate with you to the other side of the grave. It is all for nought.

But "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" made me push this pithy colloquialism to a new frontier. It is not only material wealth and earthly accomplishment torn from our grasp by death. It is, well, everything. And that includes injury, resentment, bitterness, grudges, injustice, and just plain wrong place/wrong time bad luck.

When it all ends, we have to let it go.

So, if that's true, why wait for death? Why not let it go now?

I tell you, the devil is gonna be pissed.

Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor at Clear View Counseling Wellness Center in Las Vegas and the author of "Human Matters: Wise and Witty Counsel on Relationships, Parenting, Grief and Doing the Right Thing" (Stephens Press). His columns appear on Sundays. Contact him at skalas@reviewjournal.com.