“A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”
In the new film “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” which stars Tom Hanks as the cardigan-sweatered children’s TV legend he looks so much like the real Mr. Rogers it’s no big surprise that he’s a distant relative.
Hanks is transformed and you believe he’s the one-and-only Mr. Rogers the moment he takes off his street shoes and puts on his sneakers, zips up his sweater, and looks at the camera with an expression of such peace you think maybe he’s a mannequin. But then he talks, in the delicate drawl, speaking slowly, hypnotizing the tiny ears of the children listening.
Mr. Rogers is so specific that he’s been the subject of many parodies, but no parody here. Hanks in Mr. Rogers’ skin is sincere from head-to-toe. The screenplay is by Noah Harpster and Micah Fitzerman-Blue and is based on a 1998 Esquire cover story and directed by Marielle Heller.
What the journalist discovered was that Mr. [Fred] Rogers was a man filled with faith which shaped his view on life and the world around him. He seemed to cling to the basic rules of the Holy Bible, like loving thy neighbor and yourself. He was, in fact, an ordained Presbyterian minister.
The movie is set in the late ’90s. The screenwriter Lloyd Vogel (Matthew Rhys) is an accomplished writer who wears his cynicism like a cloak. A National Magazine Award winner, he’s an example of success, including being married to an attractive and smart woman,
Andrea (Susan Kelechi Watson) and having an infant son. He has it all, the modern American dream, but underneath Vogel has daddy issues.
He runs into his father at his sister’s third marriage and heated words are exchanged and then Vogel punches his father in the face. It’s drama for sure. Perhaps the universe wanted to rub salt into his wounds because he’s assigned to do a short profile of Fred Rogers for the magazine’s “Hero” issue. Hero is not a word he’s familiar with but a writing assignment is a writing assignment, isn’t it?
So off he goes to Pittsburgh where “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” is taped on a soundstage for national syndication. Visually, director Heller gives the audience a unique view of Rogers’ neighborhood like it was an old video screen (brilliant).
Everything about the production design gives the film a fairy-tale feeling. The sets look like “sets” with the puppets and painted pasteboard. Something is endearing in the cheapness of the decor which, in the eyes of an imaginative child, would still be filled with wonder. Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood is what the viewer wants it to be. We believe it because the kids who are watching it believe in it and the man himself—Mr. Rogers.
Lloyd begins the exchange like he’s interviewing him but in truth, Rogers turns the table and interviews him instead. The result? Unexpected therapy for Lloyd who needed some coaxing to face his dark fears and find the courage to embrace the magic of being alive.
What makes “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” beautiful is that we discover that Fred Rogers is very much a kid himself and able to relate to children with ease. He respects the minds of young people—an odd thing because most adults simply tolerate children, unwilling to give their opinions “respect.” Case in point: something that Rogers brings up, the fact that adults ask children what they want to be when they grow up. It’s almost like adults suspend any relevance of those same children who experience every bit of emotion that adults feel and more.
Heller is a director who fills the movie with Mr. Rogers’ mystery, slowly revealing him bit by bit. He’s not superhuman. Mr. Rogers is very human with anger issues that he deals with by swimming, reading the Bible and playing the piano. Normal stuff. He’s also a parent with two grown sons and a man who believes in the power of love and acts upon that belief. Somewhere in all the questions the journalist, Lloyd, begins to heal.
Does loving yourself help to heal old, festering wounds? For Lloyd, it seems to be the case. We watch the cranky writer come to peace with his detached father, no longer using his anger as a crutch.
Fred Rogers cares enough to listen to Lloyd because Fred Rogers cares about us all.