Mud

Last night I watched a film called Mud. Like most fiction the plot is full of holes and the end is I suppose intentionally ambiguous. But one thing the film does well is in defining those two much bandied and ill-used words "good" and "love". Towards the end Mud tells protagonist Ellis that he is good and without doubt this is true; immature and mixed up though he is. Ellis returns the compliment but Mud and the viewer are not so sure. The briefly but oft spoken leitmotif "I love you" that starts as a platitude, grows to a hope, but becomes reality when Ellis wakes, after being treated for a snake bite, in the company of his dysfunctional parents.

It seems to me that "good" is by very nature one sided - it does not demand and often fails to be acknowledged. But "love", despite what we are taught, is not really love until it is returned.  It is like conception: unless the sperm and the egg come together and unite, no fruit can follow.  One can be good (and One is) but it takes two to love.

And I am not alone in ranking this film highly, i.e. one that I could gladly watch again.

This morning I read of one Bhupinder Singh, a volunteer handling donations, said [of survivors of the disastrous fire at Grenfell Tower]: "It is times like this that the best of our community comes out. This is where you find out how good it is to live in England and how good it is to be a Londoner." Doubtless London is not unique in this way and, living in Ireland, I no longer think the British are the bee's knees, and being British (or at least English) I may be biased, but there is something in me that concurs with Bhupinder's sentiment, ethnic minority though he or she may be from the name!