When white moths are on the wing,
And moth-like stars are flickering out
–“The Song Of Wandering Aengus,” William Butler Yeats
Whenever I need a good cry, I find myself watching The Bridges of Madison County. It is my all-time favorite movie—and an irresistible tear-jerker. You might find that surprising because at its core, the movie is about infidelity, but it goes oh so much deeper than that. It struck me recently because my husband and I decided to watch it again (most of our TV shows are on hiatus so we’re in a bit of a lull at the moment and sometimes you just need to wallow in sentimentality). Full disclaimer: I’ve watched it several times since then, too, playing it on a loop while writing this post and attending to all manner of household chores. I just can’t seem to help myself!
If you’re unfamiliar with the story, it’s a drama that takes place amidst the rolling fields, working farms, and covered bridges of Madison County, Iowa. Now, I don’t know much about Iowa—I’ve never really given it a second thought, in fact—but whenever I watch this movie and the camera pans over the gorgeous farms and fields stretching for miles and miles and the rustic covered bridges spanning the rushing rivers below, I want to run there and stay forever! I can’t explain it, but this nostalgic melancholy washes over me, though I’ve never lived in this type of setting before. I’ve always considering myself a city girl, but there’s just something so perfect about the quiet, serene beauty of living off the land. Maybe that’s a sign I’m in desperate need of silence and solace. Can’t imagine why, can you?!
OK, back to our story. Meryl Streep plays Francesca Johnson, an Italian immigrant turned Iowa “native” struggling to cope with her quiet, simplistic, lonely life as a farmer’s wife and homemaker, alongside Clint Eastwood’s Robert Kincaid, a wandering, devil-may-care, loner photographer who spends his post-divorce days chasing through African safaris and European villages.
Robert stumbles upon Francesca’s homestead on his way to photograph one of Iowa’s iconic covered bridges. He pulls up the driveway to find her—barefoot—beating rugs on the front porch and admits he’s lost his way (literally and figuratively, it turns out). Francesca adorably (Streep is insanely scrumptious in this role) bumbles the directions to Roseman Bridge, and instead offers to drive with him to show him the way because the roads aren’t marked, rendering it impossible to give directions. He accepts and the two find themselves making small talk, and sharing small intimacies, on the short drive. (If you’re wondering where Francesca’s family are, her husband—an old-school farmer whose family has owned their land/crops for generations—took their two teenage children to the Illinois State Fair so their daughter could enter her prize steer in a contest.)
Once they arrive at the bridge Francesca wanders around—trying, and failing, not to stare at this mysterious, charismatic stranger—while Robert sets up his shots for the following morning (the light isn’t good for photography because it’s already late in the day). They scope each other out, flirt a little, and he “surprises” her with some wildflowers that he picked as a thank you for her help. This is a perfect and pivotal scene: When Robert presents her with the flowers, Francesca, in a completely out-of-character move, teases that these particular stems are poisonous. She then immediately dissolves into giggles at the deadpan, mortified look on Robert’s face as he drops the bouquet. Clearly, the wildflowers are not poisonous! It’s a lovely moment that puts butterflies in your tummy and a smile on your face (Streep’s laugh is so contagious!) because not only is it the first time we hear the movie’s gorgeously haunting theme music (oh, that tear-jerking melody!) but we also get our first glimpse of their intensity for one another. Their kinship and almost heartbreaking familiarity are so palpable. And don’t get me started on the chemistry between Streep and Eastwood. It’s sizzling!!
Before we continue, let’s talk about the music for a minute. It never ceases to amaze me how a conductor can take a suite of instruments and some music and weave them together into a sultry, stirring, somber symphony that elicits emotions so palpable you can feel them pulsing deep within your soul. Almost as if you’ve embodied the character and you’re the one riding their emotional roller coaster. That is what the title song—”Doe Eyes”—does to me, every single time. As soon as that melody waltzes into a scene, I’m done. Just stick a fork in me and bring me the box of tissues, already! And then there’s the rest of the soundtrack—a wonderful, jazzy-blues mix, mostly from the 1950s, that conjures up memories of happier, simpler, homey days. It’s pure schmaltz and I cannot get enough.
Anyways, back at the farm, you sense that neither wants to part company just yet, so Francesca invites Robert inside for an iced tea and then, as their intimacy deepens, to share a home-cooked meal, which of course the nomadic soul that is Robert Kincaid cannot refuse. One of the notable things about this movie—and one of the reasons I love it so much—is the lack of “action.” The scenes are driven by the scintillating and soul-searching (in my opinion) conversation—the lines and the delivery are just … flawless—and the smokin’ hot attraction between the characters. I’ve watched this movie hundreds of times (no, that’s not an exaggeration) and I still hang on their every word in every scene. Pretty remarkable if you ask me.
Throughout their evening together they touch on all manner of topics: family, careers, marriage, children, African safaris, life on a farm in Iowa, hopes and dreams. At one point, Francesca candidly confides that she used to be a teacher and loved it, but eventually gave it up to be with her children, and because her husband didn’t like her working. She also admits that life in Iowa isn’t exactly what she dreamed of as a young girl back in Italy. There are many scenes in this movie where I so relate to Francesca and this is one of them. Simply in that sometimes our lives don’t turn out the way we anticipate–whether it’s because of choices we made or not. It’s not right or wrong, positive or negative, it just is. I think this is something many of us fight against our entire lives, wondering why or how our paths led us to one moment when it could just as easily have gone a different way. Sometimes there just are no answers or reasons.
Anyway, it becomes clear around this time that Francesca is a strong, loyal, familial, complicated woman who has lost herself somewhere along the way. Her husband is quiet, hardworking, kind, an overall good man, but it’s obvious he doesn’t truly see his wife—and you get the impression that maybe he never did. And her kids, well, they’re teenagers (ages 16 and 17); they’re in their own worlds and don’t talk to their parents much anymore (is this what we parents have to look forward to?!). She has reached somewhat of a turning point in her life, maybe even a midlife crisis. She’s lonely, isolated, and vulnerable. And desperately searching for compassion, for acceptance, for meaning, for herself. Robert Kincaid gives all that to her, in spades. He came along at just the right time and saved her.
The rest of the movie takes place across four days. Four days in which our two tortured souls come together, discover a soulmate in each other, and realize this fierce, searing, earth-shattering love for one another. Their passion is so absolute that you almost forget Francesca is a 40-something married woman and mother of two teenagers. You can’t help but view it as one of those old-time love stories that many young girls hope for as soon as they’re old enough to notice boys. I know I did, which is probably why this movie hit me so hard from the beginning. The first time I saw it (we’re talking back in 2002) I was trapped in a relationship I hated and praying desperately for the kind of love Robert Kincaid offered. So, when Clint Eastwood delivered these gut-wrenching lines: “I’ll only say this once. I’ve never said it before. But this kind of certainty comes but just once in a lifetime.” Holy hell. It rips my heart apart just writing that line, let alone hearing the agony in his voice when he says it—even to this day. The whole scene surrounding this quote is … beyond words.
The evening before her family is due to return home, the two are sharing an intimate meal in Francesca’s “formal” dining room (this is quite telling in itself considering all their previous meals had taken place in the farmhouse kitchen). Robert has just asked Francesca to run away with him and we see her packing up two suitcases and carrying them downstairs. Cut to the dinner table, where no one’s eating, and we’re hit with a double-whammy punch to the gut: the tortured resignation in Francesca’s bowed head and the dawning realization and acceptance on Robert’s face. Damn, I can already feel the tears pooling! What follows is a heart- and soul-crushing scene of Robert begging Francesca not to throw their love away and Francesca quietly and solemnly trying to convince him that the only way to save what they share is by letting him go: “We are the choices that we have made, Robert.” Shot To My Bleeding Heart.
What strikes me here, though, isn’t Francesca’s choice to let Robert walk out of her life (many of us have turned our backs on love for one reason or another), but the rationalization behind her decision. I’m going to share one part of her speech here:
“You don’t understand. Don’t you see? Nobody understands, when a woman makes a choice to marry and have children, in one way her life begins but in another way it stops. You build a life of details and you just stop and stay steady so that your children can move. And when they leave they take your life of details with them and you’re expected to move on again but you don’t even remember what it was that moved you because nobody’s asked you in so long, not even yourself.”
Damn. Talk about wanting to cry. This simple yet overwhelming truth takes my breath away. It conjures up so much heaviness: the compromises and sacrifices that we mommas make each and every day, the combined relief and terror awaiting us as empty-nesters, the worry over never regaining the autonomy we once cherished, the panic that we’re losing and wasting precious time that could be snatched away at any minute. And yet, for all the agony and trepidation, you can’t help but wonder at and appreciate the poignancy, the beauty, the purity of giving everything of yourself to another human being, to your family. That’s something we mommas surrender to over and over again from the moment we decide to have children. It’s simply our nature—this instinctive need to constantly concede and forfeit ourselves even in those moments, especially in those moments, where we feel like we have nothing left to offer. Is there any greater gift in this whole circle of life?
I think that’s why I’m so enamored with this charming, yet tragic, movie: It’s honest, raw, and real. Life isn’t a fairy tale, filled with one happy ending after another. It’s downright tedious and monotonous and dirty. It’s littered with pain, loss, fear, apathy, solitude. With broken dreams and unanswered prayers. With tragedies and death and disappointments. That doesn’t mean it’s not glorious, though, or worth living! For we can’t recognize and appreciate the good without suffering the bad. And all it takes is someone (or something) to come along and refocus the blurry lens through which you view the world and suddenly your eyes are feasting on a kaleidoscope of colors and hues. And you realize that all hope isn’t lost. That there’s still so much grace and innocence and peace in the world, if only you would remember to open your eyes and look, truly look. That’s a reminder we could all use more of these days.
But it’s not just that. For me, this movie also represents solidarity (which I crave daily) and knowing I’m not the only one who often feels lost and broken and unfulfilled and alone in the wilderness. And that it’s OK to feel that way. It’s OK to need space and time away from everyone and everything. It’s OK to not have your game face on 24/7. It’s OK to wish for something more and to have your own hopes and dreams. Just as it’s OK to feel happy and content with less. Whatever you’re feeling, it’s all OK. As Francesca so astutely points out, “Love won’t obey our expectations.” Well, neither will life, and I believe that makes it even more worth living.
I want to end this post on a lighthearted note, so I’m bringing it back to the farmhouse kitchen for a moment. This kitchen, man, it stirs up all the feels within my bones. It reminds me so much of the one from my childhood home: the flowery wallpaper; the creams, greens, and yellows scattered throughout; the rotary phone on the wall (ours was green!); the tiled floor, the Formica dining table, even down to the same exact recipe box as my mom’s (if you watch the movie, it’s perched on top of the cookbooks to the right of the sink). I think that’s what takes this movie over the top for me—that simple, whimsical box with the mustard-yellow lid and the multicolored mushrooms clustered on the sides. It’s like a little piece of my childhood right there on the screen. Clearly, I’ll never stop longing for those “good ole days!” But you know what? That’s OK, too.
Alright, that’s enough of my gushing! If you’ve managed to read this far into my hulking post, go watch this movie. I dare you—no, I double-dare you—not to cry. 😊