Simon Birch Journal Entry By Alyssa Schankman Simon Birch is a film about outsiders, friendship, and love and sacrifice revolving around the life of a diminutive twelve-year-old boy named Simon. It captures the answers to the questions studied in the course of English thus far during the short story “The Lady or the Tiger” and the novels A Separate Peace and Lord of the Flies. In the film, Simon acted as an outsider, a friend, and a sacrifice. As all those things, Simon became a hero.
I believe Simon was the key to learning the answer to the first question, “Who Are the Outsiders?” If Simon were in Lord of the Flies, he would have been like Ralph and Piggy, but he would have taught them that being an outsider could make someone a hero. Simon had power when he was an outsider, but Ralph and Piggy didn’t. That’s because Simon had faith. He believed in others and in himself. Simon knew he wasn’t meant to just be an ill-treated outsider all his life. So the answer to this essential question would be Simon is an outsider, but he finds good out of the situation.
In Simon Birch, there were two other outsiders as well. In the beginning of the film, Ben was an outsider. Joe and Simon didn’t want to accept him into their lives in the beginning, but later on they had to turn to him for help and he no longer was an outsider. That was the same case with Samneric in Lord of the Flies. Jack didn’t want to accept them into his group in the beginning because they hung around with other outsiders, but in the end Samneric were with Jack. All the way throughout the novel, Joe also was a type of outsider.
The Essay on Lord of the Flies 67
Literature versus Hollywood Many novels are such successful sellers that producers cant wait to put the story onto the big screen. Most of the time the original novel is much better than the movie because it is able to capture the characters true emotions. In the novel The Lord of the Flies William Golding was trying to capture the readers imagination. Overall the novel is better then the movie ...
Simon caused Joe to be an outsider, because Joe hung around with Simon and was friends with him, so everyone else saw Joe as an outsider. In the novel Joe could be related to Ralph, who became an outsider during the novel because he was Piggy’s friend. In the film, Simon also gave us the answer to the question “What are the Obligations of Friendship.” In the novel A Separate Peace, Gene ended up failing all of the obligations of friendship, so he wasn’t a good friend to anybody. Simon, however, knew that the obligations of friendship were love, care, loyalty, honesty, trust, and faith, and he lived up to them to be a good friend to Joe, Mrs.
Wentworth, Ben, and even Reverend Russell. Simon fulfilled these obligations with these people in many ways. First of all, Simon showed love and care to Mrs. Wentworth. He always said hi to her and talked to her and was really nice to her whenever he saw her, so in return she became a friend to him and showed him love also by going to his baseball games and making him a sweater. Also, Simon showed faith, honesty, and trust to Reverend Russell.
Although the Reverend didn’t accept what Simon showed him, or believe in it, Simon was still a good friend to him. Simon taught Reverend Russell about God’s plan, and he gave the Reverend faith that God had a plan for everyone. In the end of the film, Simon and the Reverend trusted each other. That was because Simon was honest with the Reverend in everything he told him. That was an obligation of friendship that Simon showed the Reverend existed between people. Simon gave the obligations of friendship to the Reverend to give to his son, Joe.
Simon also was a good friend to Ben and Joe. When Joe made it clear that he didn’t want anything from Ben, and he didn’t want Ben in his life, Simon cared about Ben and tried to be nice and grateful that he could befriend such a nice person. In A Separate Peace, that’s how Gene should have been towards Leper, but instead Gene shunned Leper away like Joe did to Ben. The ultimate friendship in the film, between Joe and Simon, was achieved. Simon showed Joe every single obligation. Simon taught Joe faith, to believe in himself and God’s plan, he showed love and care to Joe when Joe’s mom died, Simon was honest with Joe, admitting that he swung the bat that led Joe’s mother to death, Simon trusted in and believed in Joe, and Simon was loyal to Joe and stood up for him and stood by him.
The Essay on Cohesion With Contrast Gene Vs Finny
Although a friendship often implies many similarities, Gene and Finny also appear very different in many aspects of life. Their friendship gives the impression that at some times it was unstable, but overall it was bound to be everlasting. This companionship is a primary example of any real-life friendship of the common person. It is possible to portray many differences within a friendship, but ...
This was a lot like Finny with Finny and Gene’s friendship. Although Gene failed as a friend, Finny was a lot like Simon in the friendship. Finny tried to give Gene faith, Finny had faith in Gene as a person, Finny cared for Gene, and Gene wasn’t honest with Finny, but Finny was very honest with Gene. Finny was loyal to Gene and trusted Gene, who later failed him in the end of the novel. Simon Birch also portrays the answer to the question “Is Sacrifice Necessary for Love to Exist?” In the end of the novel, Simon is a sacrifice. Simon sacrifices himself because he loves and cares about all the children that were on the bus.
Also, the sacrifice Simon made was necessary for the true love between him and Joe to exist, because Simon believes that was God’s plan for him. In “The Lady or the Tiger,” the lady had a choice to either sacrifice her lover to a tiger or another lady. Simon didn’t have a choice about his sacrifice; he had to sacrifice his life because he loved everybody. All three of these questions can relate to each other and it is seen in the film how they do. Simon uses the obligations of friendship to become a hero even though he is considered an outsider. By the time Simon sacrifices his life to save the children, he is no longer an outsider, because everyone truly loves him..
