[Tyr Zalo Hawk]: 712.Essays.The Tangled Webs That We Weave

Ah, relationships. Whether it be how potassium and water should never get together at a party, how the circle of life really works, or even you and your distant second cousin who you never really did like but tolerate because you only have to see him for one day at a family reunion, relationships determine our reactions to the actions and words of anything and everything around us. Relationships make the world go round, as most circles do. In the movies Crash and The Queen of Trees, two movies which seem vastly different on the surface level, relationships are explored in expert detail. Some are beneficial, some are extremely detrimental, but each is a crucial part of the overall system that we like to call “Life.” 
The relationships themselves are everywhere. The Queen of Trees presents us with interactions between animals of all sorts. Each creature lives its life based on what it needs to do to survive, and that, of course, is always going to get it into trouble with anything that needs the same resources to survive, or to get along with anything that can assist it in doing so. The ants in the film act as an ally to the fig tree valiantly guarding her from attack by various bugs and other small creatures, helping both her and her seedlings to be safe. All the animals that eat from the fig have developed a dependency on the tree for food, and a competition with each other for said nutrition. Without the fig tree, however, none of them would interact at all. In Crash the people relate with each other in similar fashions, except the fig tree is called L.A. Police officers just trying to get by must interact with the common folk who break the law, such as Officer Ryan’s late night rendezvous with Cameron and Christine. A lone man walking home gets picked up by a self-conscious, off-duty cop becoming a dependant on the cop for his ride. Anthony, a ‘gangster’ who believes he is better than nearly everyone, has a relationship with those people whom he considers below him in that they still influence his actions. No matter where you’re at, or whether your fig tree is actually a sprawling metropolis, the relationships that people form from chance encounters, planned get-togethers, or just by habit spin a web of intrigue that needs to be played out.
Who’s ever heard of a stagnant relationship in a movie when one of the main characters is involved? No one, that’s who. ThoughThe Queen of Trees is a documentary that introduces us to dozens of relationships, it would be nothing without the development of these relationships. Sure, the ants protect their mother fig, at least until their interests start conflicting with their great mother’s and they ignore her slow death for their own personal gain. Animals that eat the figs are destroying the lives of all the wasps, parasites, and, of course, the young figs. It’s not all bad though. Fig wasps are hyper-dependant on the tree for a place to lay their eggs, to grow, and to eventually die, and the animals that eat the figs will live on to see another day. Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet from Africa, Officer Ryan is meant to protect the people of the city from danger, and yet he harasses the young couple enough to cause serious tension between all three of them. Eventually, this pans into a serious predicament where Christine must depend on this bigot of a cop to save her life. The D.A., Rick, fails to support with his wife, to be there when she falls and breaks her leg; he’s just not there when she needs him the most. In the end, Peter’s ride home with Officer Hansen costs him his life because of a simple misunderstanding. It seems that no matter what the situation, or who is involved, even the best things just go bad when there’s a conflict of interests; marriages can nearly fall apart, friendships can dissolve, and even enjoyable car rides can end in murder. At the same time, even the worst of situations, like attempted muggings, can end up turning around someone’s life for the better. Even breaking your leg can make you realize who your one true friend really is. With the good must inevitably come the bad, but that doesn’t mean that it all ends when the bad comes.
All of these relationships become the driving force behind the movies themselves. Crash especially makes use of failed relations in driving forward a dramatic story. Nothing says drama like terrible relationships, after all. When Cameron and Christine are accosted by Officer Ryan, it very nearly tears apart their marriage by forcing them to rethink the direction of their life and their value system. When his store is destroyed, Farhad goes to shoot the man he believes is responsible, Daniel the locksmith, all because they couldn’t communicate with each other well enough. Each relation helps build the story as well as sense of Pathos in the movie, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you make a good movie. Meanwhile, the documentary gives us the same senses when it personifies the creatures in order to make their relations seem more real. One cannot help but cringe when the baby hornbill is forced to wait behind its older brother for food during before the rainy season. Even the wasp’s plight as they are infested by the parasites and slowly die evokes some sort of emotion in us because of their struggle to complete their life’s work while being ripped apart. We’re balanced from utter despair by being given hope with the fig’s continued existence and the knowledge that, in some way or another, thousands of animals were provided for by a single tree. In this way, we form a relationship with these movies. Of course, if the relationship with the audience turns out to be a bad one, then we’re going to need a really good director when we try to make the film about it.
Here, in ‘reality,’ relationships hold a power over us so great that it could easily defy the power to explain. We’re driven to do everything we can to keep relationships going with people, to interact with them until our original goal is either met or so far out of our reach that it is now impossible to achieve. Christine and Cameron eventually learn how to work through their troubles in order to keep their marriage intact. A young thief named Anthony finds that he’s not who he thought he was in comparison to those around him, and shifts towards another way of life, to get him to that place he wants to be with those he tries to set himself apart from. Animals return to the fig tree time after time, knowing it as a dependant source of attainable satisfaction in their lives. They insist on having a relationship because, somewhere in their nature, they already know it is impossible to live alone, even if being alone is our goal in our relationships.
So whether good or bad, short or long, complex or so simple even broccoli could understand, relationships are, unequivocally, the driving force behind our world and our lives. As a great man once said “No man is an island unto himself.” After all, there’s still the ocean surrounding him, the sky above, and probably a palm tree with two coconuts hanging in the tree, and two strangers just hanging around. That’s how life works: everything coming together with everything else, whether you like your cousin or not.


Works Cited
The Queen of Trees. Deeble & Stone Productions Thirteen/WNET (PBS-Nature) New
York, 2006. Patricia, Clarkson, Narrator
Crash. Lionsgate, 2004. Paul Haggis, Director.

© Tyr Hawkaluk (2004-Present)