Deja Vu

"Time, like an ever-rolling stream, soon bears us all away"*

Time's relentlessness cannot be overcome. A moment once past cannot be lived again. Except, of course, in science fiction, where time travel is fertile ground for imagining. Tony Scott's Deja Vu utilizes that mental playground as it tells the story of seeking to bring salvation to a doomed people.

The film is set in New Orleans on Fat Tuesday as people are preparing for the great party. But in the midst of the preparations, a terrorist act takes place, killing hundreds of innocent people. ATF agent Doug Carlin (Denzel Washington) begins investigating, and is soon brought into a top secret project that allows the government to look back in time four days. The plan is to watch and find who did this and bring them to justice. They focus on a woman who was found murdered, but couldn't have been a victim of the terrorist act -- she holds the key to discovering the truth. But Carlin soon discovers there is a greater potential for this technology.

On one level, this is a fun thriller filled with all the explosions and car crashes you'd expect from a Jerry Bruckheimer film. A scene in which Carlin drives in the current day, while looking at 4 days ago and trying to navigate traffic is outstanding. The level of excitement and suspense keeps the viewer alert and involved throughout the film.

Sci-fi nearly always requires that we suspend belief a bit. To be sure, the whole concept of time travel that the film relies on is impossible (at least from all we know of the universe at this point). But it is easy to let ourselves be carried away in the flow of the story. Even if it isn't possible, we certainly wish that it could be done.

At another level, time travel stories often present us with interesting philosophical and theological questions. Are things fixed -- predestined? Do the choices we make affect what is destined to take place? What happens if we change something in the past -- or can we?

There are a couple spots in the film where these questions get dealt with briefly. There is an acknowledgment that physics is not the end of all discussion. There has to be something beyond physics, and that is where spirituality comes into play. Unfortunately (or maybe it's really a good thing), the God talk (as well as the scientific talk) is always spoken very quickly so we can't really analyze it for its flaws. (Trying to explain God or science really require more attention than this film is able to give to either.)

This also allows us to look for meanings that are deeper than just a story about blowing things up. We can consider in what ways God is involved in our world.

Scott seems to like to include a Christ figure in films. He did so with Washington in Man on Fire (see Melinda Ledman's examination of the Christ figure there.) Here, trying to avoid too many spoilers, there is a saving death (which is both an individual salvation and a broad salvation), a resurrection, and new life for those who are dead. The resurrection is witnessed (or recognized) by a woman, who doesn't tell anyone (as is the case in the Gospel of Mark). And she is left with a message that cannot be believed. She asks, "What if you had to tell someone the most important thing in the world, but you knew they'd never believe you?" In some ways, this is the essence of the Christian proclamation of the Resurrection.

I love Christ figures. I probably see them where others don't. While the parallels here are obvious, I'm not sure they make for a good Christ figure. There is something missing here. In spite of the quick rattling off of some God language and talk of what is beyond physics, there is no real spiritual component to this Christ figure. That absence leaves the depiction a bit flat and lifeless.

"Time, like an ever-rolling stream, soon bears us all away" (Did I say that already?) In Deja Vu, the current swirls around some interesting questions, even if it never really answers them.

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* Hymn, "O God, Our Help in Ages Past" by Isaac Watts (altered)