![]() ![]() His best friend's mother is dead, and Simon has been the instrument of her death. There is one moment that does properly represent both Simon Birch's awful pain and his recognition of what he must now do to assuage this pain. Simon Birch only occasionally does justice to the novel's claim that the dwarf-sized Simon has a clear vision of God's purposes and of his role in that purpose. The film leaves out Irving's rich depiction of clergy who don't believe in God and who don't know what to do with a young boy who not only does believe in God but knows he is on a mission from God. ![]() The theology of the book is also truncated. The story is drastically compressed and given a new ending. Irving did not allow Johnson to use the names of any of his characters, hence Owen Meany becomes Simon Birch and Owen's best friend, John, the narrator of the story, becomes Joe. The text for this first-ever column in its new location is taken from the first chapter of John Irving's novel A Prayer for Owen Meany: "I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice-not because of his voice, or because he was the smallest person I ever knew, or even because he was the instrument of my mother's death, but because he is the reason I believe in God I am a Christian because of Owen Meany." Not every one of these biweekly columns will begin with a text, but it is appropriate in this case, because I am just back from my annual trek to the Montreal World Film Festival where a film version of Irving's novel, titled Simon Birch, premiered to cheers from the audience for director Mark Stephen Johnson and the young star, 11-year-old Ian Michael Smith.
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