Based on James O’Barr’s groundbreaking indie comic book, The Crow is by far one the greatest cult movies of all time.
Between its nightmarish story-draped heavily in themes of true love, vengeance and redemption-to the morbid mystique surrounding it following the tragic death of star Brandon Lee, The Crow is like watching a dark poem unfold on screen.
Lee’s performance as the resurrected harbinger of vengeance Eric Draven was as chilling as it was eye opening (especially considering that it ended in his death). Micheal Wincott’s portrayal of the film’s big bad Top Dollar was violently charming. And the final confrontation between the two, whether it was Draven using a cross as a sword or Dollar’s emotionally sincere confession to an opponent he thinks defeated or Draven using the collective pain of his brutally murdered true love to break Dollar, the film is a gothic classic.
But one thing a lot of people seem to ignore is the classic references sprinkled throughout the film. For instance, when ring leader T-Bird is is facing a fiery death at Draven’s hands, he quotes John Milton with his final, terrified breath. “Abashed the Devil stood, and felt how awful goodness was.”
But the one line that always stood out to me belonged to Draven himself. While working his way up the food chain of his targets, he comes face to face with Darla, the mother of a girl he and his fiancé cared for before they were murdered. Darla’s drug addiction and horrible taste in men had driven her daughter Sarah away, and Eric and his fiancé Shelly were the only thing between Sarah and a full time life on the streets.
But as Eric squeezes the fresh morphine from Darla’s veins, exorcising the chemical monkey that has long lived on her back, he looks her straight in the eye, straight in the soul, and tells her “mother is the word for God on the lips and hearts of all children. do you understand? Your daughter is out there in the streets, waiting for you.” It is the terrible yet poetic message Darla needs.
I’ve often considered it the most poignant moment in a movie full of them. I’ve also considered that line the most accurate description about mothers. Nothing else even comes close. While Eric was visiting unholy and righteous wrath on his killers, he managed to save two lives along the way, salvaging the previously doomed relationship between Sarah and Darla before either of them could wind up in early graves.
And no other collection of words I’ve heard before or since has summed up the importance a mother has in our lives. Not only is she the chief agent of our creation, who has sustained and nourished us from our very first heartbeat, but nothing has a larger hand in shaping what we are and what we become than our mother’s love. She the first thing we are ever truly aware of and I’ve often suspected that for most of us, her name is the last thing that passes through our mind before we finally rest in the grave.
So if you can, make sure to hug your mom today. She really is the author of your story (or one of the most important, anyway) and she is the closest thing to genuine divinity any of us will ever truly know.
Happy Mother’s Day
