Theme of Courage in Forrest Gump Movie Essay Example

The classic 1994 film Forrest Gump, written by Eric Roth, centers around the idea of courage and strength, focusing mainly on the life of Forrest Gump. Forrest is the character that embodies what it means to be courageous and strong-minded, knowing exactly how to deal and cope with difficult situations. The direct foil of Forrest Gump is Jenny Curran. Following the separation of Jenny from her abusive childhood household, Jenny’s emotional courage was nonexistent. From childhood, to adulthood, to motherhood, Jenny lacks the nerve and backbone to deal with adversities head on. It's almost like Jenny never grew out of being a child; she runs away, lies, and needs constant supervision in order to stay safe. Jenny continued to dig herself deeper into a hole of weakness, selfishness, and isolation. Forrest Gump demonstrates the idea that lack of emotional courage after experiencing separation will convolute a timorous, meekly individual’s life, leaving them with an unfulfilling, egocentric, subservient existence until they are able to find their freedom and self-confidence.

Jenny’s childhood was filled with fear, abuse, and neglect, leaving her with ongoing trauma; therefore, Jenny decided the best coping mechanism is running away. This is symbolized in the first few minutes of the movie when Jenny’s abusive father is searching for her and drunkenly yells, “Jenny! Where’d you run off to?”. From the very beginning of the movie the viewers can see that Jenny does not have emotional courage, confidence, or reasonable coping mechanisms. Whenever she is in a tough situation, her first instinct is to run off and not deal with it. This point is further executed when she gives Forrest the advice to run away from the people who have been relentlessly bullying him; thus creating the famous line, “Run Forrest, Run”. She again tells Forrest to run away from any problem he has in Vietnam, she told him he should not try to be the hero or saviour. However, this advice is not given because Jenny fully believes it will solve problems or help him in the long run, this advice is given because it’s the only advice she knows; every problem she has had in her life leading up to this moment, she has dealt with by running away. After Jenny’s father questions where Jenny ran off to, the focus is put on Jenny and Forrest as children, running away into a nearby cornfield- this is when the viewers first learn about Jenny’s enthrallment with birds. Jenny and Forrest run into the middle of the cornfield and Jenny kneels down and shakily prays, “Dear God make me a bird, so I can fly far, far away from here”. Jenny envies birds for their freedom to get up and leave whenever they see fit. They have the ability and courage to leave a situation when it is no longer serving them. She wants this life for herself, but she lacks any emotional courage or confidence to achieve this goal. Throughout the film, the viewers see that Jenny does not want to feel alone. She clings onto- and relies on- things that make her feel safe and protected. Obviously one of these safe things are birds. Jenny continuously prays to be a bird and mentions them throughout the entirety of the movie. Birds symbolize the freedom and courage Jenny wants for herself, but she knows she will never achieve. By constantly referring to birds and wanting to be a bird, she gives herself an easy-out. Jenny is saying, “birds are the only things with freedom, therefore to achieve freedom I have to be a bird”. She does not know how to achieve freedom and therefore has convinced herself that freedom is unattainable as she is. She has to be a bird instead of changing her cowardly ways. Fantasizing about a better life is a lot easier than changing her life from what she is used to. Another example of this is when Jenny moved out of her own childhood home and lived with her grandmother, sneaking out every night to see Forrest. Forrest naively mentions that he does not know what she’s afraid of. Since Forrest is a very courageous person, he does not know what it is like to wholeheartedly fear being alone and out of control, like Jenny does. Instead of dealing with her own problems and fixing them in an attainable way, Jenny decides it’s easier to cling onto what she aspires to be. When there is something in her life that has freedom, courage, and confidence, she knows there will be some control and ease in her life. This is why throughout the whole movie, Jenny is never alone. She is always moving around with different people and doing new things creating a false sense of freedom.

Going into adulthood, Jenny continued her pathetic, gutless way of living- not trying to better herself in any way. She became a stripper singing naked on stage, but no one listened to her voice. So, when Forrest entered the strip club and saw men trying to grab Jenny, he instinctively went to save her because he knew she would not have the ability to save herself. After Forrest carried Jenny off the stage, she angrily ran outside with Forrest walking close behind her. They walk over to the bridge and Jenny shyly asks, “Do you think I can fly off this bridge?”. There are a few moments in the film where Jenny contemplates suicide; egging herself on by reassuring herself she will have true freedom, just like the birds do. This point further exposes Jenny’s jealousy she has towards birds and their natural instincts. In her mind, she will achieve true freedom by becoming a bird, flying off the top of the bridge to her death. However, she does not do it. Once again her lack of emotional courage holds her back. If she wanted to be as free as a bird why was she as cowardly as a hyena. When Forrest was speaking on stage in Washington about the Vietnam war, he spotted Jenny walking through the Washington Monument’s waters calling to Forrest- this is where they reunite after Forrest returns from Vietnam. Jenny then takes Forrest to a Black Panther meeting. While they were there Forrest watched as Jenny and her boyfriend, Wesley, got into an argument. Forrest saw the argument get more and more heated and, without a second thought, stepped in when Jenny's boyfriend slapped her. Forrest was there with Jenny. He protected and stuck up for Jenny. He loved Jenny. However, Jenny took Wesley’s side, saying, “he doesn’t mean it when he does things like this”. Jenny knew Wesley was not good for her but she did not have the courage or confidence to leave; she did not want to be alone again. Jenny’s decision is like staring down two paths; one is straightforward and simple, and the other is dark, jagged, and full of sharp turns. Any reasonable person would choose the straight, easy path, ensuring a safe and happy life; Jenny chooses the path she knows will be harder- self-sabotaging herself for the present and future. She went on the bus with Wesley and began travelling the country doing powerful drugs in hopes of “living in harmony” and “expanding her mind”. She does not truly believe drugs will do this; she just wants to move around to get rid of the “stuck” feeling she has with life. Travelling around the country experimenting with different types of drugs made her feel the false sense of freedom she was so desperately chasing. The feeling of freedom was not real. It is simply her being irresponsible and immature. Jenny chased any type of freedom she could find, even if it was only temporary.

Finally, after Forrest is finished telling his story to the people listening on the bus bench, he runs to Jenny’s apartment after receiving a letter from her. When Forrest goes to her apartment, Jenny drops the bombshell that Forrest is the father of her child. Jenny waited years to tell Forrest about his child because she did not have the emotional courage to let him know when she first found out; the only reason she finally decided to tell him was because she had just learned about her illness. Jenny relied on Forrest to be there for her, even when she treated him terribly and left him multiple times, she knew he would always come back. Jenny took Forrest’s kindness, strength, and courage for granted and only used him when she saw fit. Jenny married Forrest solely for the sake of her son. Jenny’s actions were done selfishly. While giving her son a good home once she passed seems selfless, her actions towards Forrest- sending him the letter only when she found out she was sick, dumping the child on him and giving him all of the responsibility, and selfishly abusing Forrest’s character so she could get what she wanted- were not selfless. Jenny lived her life completely selfishly, irresponsibly, and cowardly up until the day she died. While Forrest was visiting Jenny’s grave, a flock of birds flew overhead. This symbolizes Jenny’s final found emotional courage that she could not achieve while she was alive. She died selfish, weak, and faint-hearted on all counts. Once she died she had no more obligations to change the way she acted; she instead relied on death to finally change her into what she wanted to be her entire living existence- free. Jenny wasted her entire life being craven, unreliable, and self-centred. She was surrounded by people more confident, courageous, and stronger than her, but she could never achieve the same mindset; Jenny did not want to change the way she lived her life, therefore death was the only thing that could save her.