In the evenings, when I'm tired from work, I tend to stream some online movies while doing some other less work intensive activities.  I realized a long time ago that I'm not as sharp at night, so grinding poker is typically not ideal. You never know what will be on, but the other night I re-watched a movie that I wanted to recommend.  I had watched it a couple years ago that touched me by its poignancy. Elegy (2008) was directed by Spanish director Isabel Coixet based on the Philip Roth novel, The Dying Animal.  It stars Ben Kingsley, who I feel is one of the best actors of his generation, and the beautiful Penelope Cruz, with Dennis Hopper and Peter Saargard playing supporting roles. 



Elegy refers to a poem of mourning.  The movie does a wonderful job of capturing the main character's struggle to find meaning and relationship.  Kingley's character is a cultural critic and erudite professor who is a caught up in a state of 'emancipated manhood.'  Previously married, and with a grown son who resents him for leaving his mother, he has multiple relationships with women, often his students, which are always casual, brief and sexual in nature.  That is until he meets the independent and self-actualized character played by Penelope Cruz.  He is so sophisticated and in control by outward appearances, but lacks something very deep that Penelope touches in him.  The bittersweet second half of the movie impresses that sense of mourning for a life that could have been different.  Life is about love.  Your attempts to avoid the heartache that comes with loving will always be foiled.  Which comes back to the old saying that it is better to have loved and lost, than to have never loved at all.

And if my new age description of the movie doesn't entice some of you 'horndogs', the movie is worth watching simply to appreciate Penelope's 'assets'.