It’s rare that something on television or in the movies really grips me lately. I see people running around and hear things that are supposed to be shocking or some new view of reality, but really it seems like a lot of people just vying for attention. But I saw a movie a few days ago sort of stuck in my mind.

The Lord of the Flies has been remade several times and originally was a book that I was forced to read in middle school. The movie version that I recently watched was made in 1990, a solid year after I wrote my paper on it in eighth grade. Anyways, I watched the movie which was Americanized version from the original story about British boys, but retained its core themes. It both shocks and gives us a view of reality.

Now that I am older and have experienced more life the story meant more to me watching it at age 32 compared with age 13. It’s not just a story, or an adventure like so many shows like Lost or Survivor, but a picture of life itself.

The movie, like the book, is about a bunch of school boys who are in a wreck that leaves them stranded on a tropical island with no adult supervision. They have to not only survive the elements, but survive each other. The kids are about middle school age, which is probably why my teacher made us read it. But the story is not really just about middle schoolers; rather it is a metaphor for all humanity.

Simply put, humans are like children left on an island without their parents and we are struggling to survive. As time goes by, it seems that the greedy, tricky and selfish ones are taking advantage and control from the sensible, kind and generous ones.

The responsible boys try to keep up not only the sense of rational society, but also keep the signal fires going. They are keeping hope alive. There are people here on our little island of humanity are working to make things better while desperately praying to God to come and make things right. They are clinging to the hope that there is something better.

The strong ones in the story take what they want and the weak ones suffer their greed and impetuousness. Surprisingly and horribly, the group is attracted to the strong but evil ones through their desire to have fun, avoid work, and be part of the in group which at this point resembles some kind of gang.

At the end of the movie, the remaining boy is left fending for himself. It is a dire situation. His only hope is that he will be rescued. The audience is also left feeling for him that he will not only make it but be taken out of that situation and justice will be served.

The last scene of the movie has hoard of boys dressed in war paint and carrying spears chasing the last good boy through the jungle as it burns. He comes running out onto the beach and falls at the feet of a pair of men’s boots. We look up from the boy’s perspective to see that they have finally been rescued.

As the wild boys come tumbling out of the jungle and see that there are now responsible adults on the island, the boys begin to cry. They are, after all of this, still just children. The man looks down at them incredulously asks,” what are you doing? ” Is this not a picture of us on our planet? Despite all of the awful things that we do, we do them because really, we are scared. We serve our needs and try to make ourselves in to grown ups or gods, but we don’t know what we are doing. At aged 13 I don’t remember really understanding too much except it seemed like an awful, yet far-fetched tale, but now watching the news at night I understand that it is really about our world today.

So if I can find my English teacher, I can finally send him my updated version, just a few years late.