Hopefulness of Tomorrowland: Which Wolf is Fed?

A few days ago as I was whiling away my time at home in India I quite serendipitously came across the movie TomorrowLand on TV. Given my fascination with anything having to do with  fantasy this movie seemed quite a good fit. Seeing it all the way trough I was stuck about its exploration of the theme of hopefulness. 

Hope is a deeply human quality. An infant cries because it is hopeful that someone will pay attention and give it milk. Hope is so fundamental to human development that Eric Erickson put it as one of the fundamental developmental qualities of the human being. 

The central value around which the story is spun around is a powerful vignette of two wolves. This vignette is used by a hopeful daughter, Cassie, the protagonist of the story, to encourage her  Dad who was despairing at having lost his job. Every human being has two wolves one that fosters despair another that fosters hope. "Which one will win?" Answer: "The one you feed!"

The theme reemerges throughout the movie at multiple levels - between two individuals and also as a whole civilization. Having a sense of hopefulness about the future will make one act with a sense of self-giving and work towards  a positive future. Having a despairing outlook will reinforce negativity and make people give up on the present. 

In fact, the arch villain in the movie is one who has figured out a way to feed the despairing wolf of the whole civilization. Thus hoping that the destruction of life as we know it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.  The job of the protagonist is to defeat the despair with hope. Her support is an andriod girl, Athena (quite aptly named after the Greek Goddess of wisdom, craft and war), who is programmed to find dreamers who are fueled by hope. 

Athena builds one on one relationships with individuals like Cassie to fuel their hope into something substantial in order to destroy the despairing villain. This is quite relevant to the world we live in today where whether is America, Europe or Asia, a number of right-wing governments are coming to power fueled by a sense of despair. 

The way to quell mass despair is not by a logic of power. Rather it should be by the way of love building itself to hope. In the movie, in order to get one of the dreamers, Frank (played by George Clooney) to be hopeful, Athena falls in love with him even though she knew a relationship between man and andriod would never be possible. Still she justifies her love by saying that Frank needed someone to believe in him. 

Suspending disbelief and having faith in people's ability for hope is essential for social renewal to happen. As Paul says in 1 Cor:12-13 a future oriented hope is ultimately buttressed on love and faith. It is this trinune virtue of faith, hope and love that will feed the hopeful wolf of this civilization that is on the brink of breaking down.