Love, Rain on Me
by Samuel Febres
I recently had the pleasure of viewing Reign Over Me, starring Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle. If you have not seen this movie, you are doing yourself a disservice if you do not rent it as soon as you get an opportunity.
The movie is about a man named Charlie played by Adam Sandler.
Through an unfortunate event, Charlie loses his entire family. An old college roommate of his, Alan Johnson (Don Cheadle), with whom he spent two years happens to come across him and tries to re-establish their relationship. He is aware of Charlie’s loss, and wants to see how he is doing. Charlie obviously isn’t his normal self and as the movie progresses you see how their friendship develops and grows despite the struggles that are affecting Charlie.
The movie is about sacrifice, suffering, loss, grieving, love, hope and the power of words. Several things stood out to me about this particular movie, and without giving away too much of story for those who have not seen the movie, I would like to go into these things.
Grief and Suffering
This world is full of grief and suffering yet for all the suffering we have individually gone through in life, we as individuals can never truly understand the greatness and the powerful effect it can have on someone other than ourselves. In this movie, Charlie’s suffering had been so great that it had literally changed who he was. He had become a recluse and retreated inside of his headphones, music collection, and apartment. His in-laws had tried unsuccessfully to make contact with him, but he wanted nothing to do with them. In their despair, they used negative words to try to “change” or help Charlie, or just to even attempt to draw him closer to them.
Despite their well meaning intentions, all they did was push Charlie further and further away. They too had lost their daughter and grandchildren, but were apparently able to better manage their suffering and grief. This was an important point of the movie. Despite the fact that both Charlie and his in-laws had suffered loss, they had managed to overcome that grief and move on with their lives quicker/easier than Charlie had, but they were unable to accept the fact that he was not done grieving, and was unable to heal as quickly as they were.
We have all been created unique and different, and just because we may suffer similar circumstances in life, that does not mean we truly understand what another individual is really going through. Some people take longer to heal than others and have different ways of coping. Charlie’s parents were trying to force him to move on and by their actions were basically telling him to “get over it” whether they realized it or not. If you have ever had someone tell you to get over it while you were struggling through something as huge as a lost life or any other event that caused major depression, you’ll understand that life just isn’t that easy and neither is our ability to overcome that suffering. We should NEVER minimize someone else’s suffering because we feel that by now, they should have moved on past a particular hurt or pain.
Alan does an excellent job of truly being a friend to Charlie. He continually sacrifices of his time and energy even though the relationship hits a few rocky points. Alan never lets those moments get in the way of his desire to first be a friend to Charlie. His actions are one of the most gracious acts of self sacrifice I have recently seen in a movie. It didn’t involve him having to lay down his life physically, but he gave of his time and energy to be the friend that Charlie needed.
Healing
Desiring for Charlie to be emotionally restored, Alan quickly realized that trying to manipulate situations to “help” Charlie was not beneficial.
Alan continued on with their relationship and just poured into Charlie’s life more and more. At one point, Charlie volunteers that maybe he should get help, and Alan encourages him to do so. He refers him to a doctor who happens to work in his building and Charlie begins going to counseling sessions but isn’t very receptive. For a number of visits, he goes, Alan accompanying him and waiting outside. During the sessions, Charlie consistently asks if it’s ok for him to leave without spending much time in the session. The counselor always says if that’s what he wants to do, and Charlie says he does, and proceeds to do so. Eventually, after one of these sessions, the counselor tells Charlie as he is getting up to leave, (and I’m paraphrasing), “You don’t have to talk to me about it, but you need to talk to someone about it Charlie. That’s the only thing that will help you grow.”
Charlie steps out of the room, sits down next to Alan and one of the most powerful scenes in a movie occurs at that moment. Charlie begins to tell Alan about his wife and his 3 daughters. 
Finally, the healing process can begin, and something that had been so incredibly difficult to do for years was made possible because Charlie had someone in his life that was willing to be a friend and sacrifice of his time and energy and because he cared about and loved him. At that moment, because he had someone he could talk to, who had no “agenda” Charlie could openly begin the healing process he so desperately needed.
Lesson
Life is a process, and I think the lesson to take away from this movie is more than anything, people need a friend sometimes. Not someone who will try to “fix” them or “help” them but someone who will let them be as they are and love them. There will be a time for growth and change when areas that need help will be addressed, all the more if we are also praying for the relationships in our lives.
If GOD is the one who makes seeds grow in our lives and the lives of those around us, our job is to be faithful to love and to be faithful to listen to GOD and to others. Invest in the lives of others and love them for who they are. Have no hidden agenda to change them. Pray for them and love them. Be available to them when they need you, but remember there is probably nothing in your power alone that can change someone’s life. Trust GOD to make seeds grow, just make sure you’re planting them and not crushing them underfoot.
If you have seen this movie, please let me know what you think of what I’ve written or your own thoughts on the movie or how it relates to life. I would like to know.
