OK first off, let me just say that if you haven’t seen, and are planning on going to see, Reign over Me, the new Adam Sandler/Don Cheadle movie, you might want to skip this post. I’ll be providing some details about the movie that you might not want to know going in. No, not the ending or anything like that, but still…..
OK, now if you are still reading, I assume you are ok with knowing this so here it goes.
There’s a scene in the movie that really rang true to me, because I’ve been there. Shortly after Charlie tries to commit “suicide by cop”, he goes from being released from jail to a 3 day stay at Roosevelt Island for a psych evaluation. During this time, he doesn’t really say anything, he just has the look of a defeated man, while everyone else talks around him about what to do with him. He has no input, nor does he offer any.
I recognized the feeling. There was a time, after a dissociative episode followed by a failed suicide attempt, when I was in a similar situation. I really didn’t have anything to say, I was defeated. To my mind, I couldn’t even kill myself correctly, I had nothing to offer in terms of how to take care of myself, it was up to other people to figure that out. I was resigned to the fact that these other people would decide what to do with me, all I could do was sit there. Just like Adam Sandler did in those scenes.
I don’t know how accurate his overall portrayal of a widower who lost his entire family on 9/11 is, and I don’t know if everyone will find it believable, but given the one part that I do have some experience with, I found it pretty true to life.
The rest of the movie is emotional, sad, touching, etc. Everything you’d expect given the plot. It’s pretty good, but probably a bit heavy for some people.