Escapism with Nowhere Else to Go

“You can’t really know where you are going until you know where you have been.”

- Maya Angelou

On a surface level, you may love a film for the beautiful imagery or the lovable comic relief that you’ve known since you were a child. When you get older though, you might realize that the hour and forty-five minutes you spent fully immersed escaping the feeling of now has passed. If you enjoyed such a brief feeling of escape, you’ve probably enjoyed the movie “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” by director/actor Ben Stiller and will more than likely enjoy the documentary “Minding The Gap” by director Bing Liu, two films that express some form of escapism.

In Stiller’s “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” we meet our main character Walter Mitty. He’s about to lose his job, but his daydreams seem to ease the situation. Walter deals with his anxiety and PTSD with fantasy and elaborate daydreams featuring him jumping out of a helicopter into the Icelandic Sea or even him skating down Grundarfjörður, the peninsula of Iceland. Because of his anxiety, these elaborate fantasies are very out of character for him. It’s almost like it’s an escape. That feeling of being stuck just disappears when he goes into fantasy, so the question is why or what does he want to escape? He wants to escape the hard reality that he’s been dealt: he’s losing his job and he’s too anxious to ask the girl he likes out on a date. Walter Mitty relies on escapism because the reality he’s living in is too much for him. When he snaps back to real life, we see in the film that he is ridiculed and made fun of for zoning out. It’s no doubt that his coworkers have something to do with this fantasy. Everyone around him, his coworkers included, contribute to his escapist fantasies.

“Minding the Gap” by Bing Liu is a beautiful documentary of how life isn’t all that it seems at the surface. We meet our group of misfits: Zack Mulligan, Keire Johnson, and our director Bing Liu as they climb to the top of an old parking garage to skate on the top lot. We learn that Zach has used skateboarding to escape a controlling household as Keire struggles with conflicting thoughts about his father while feeling like the black sheep of his own family. Their tale follows them for a decade as they use skating as a form of escapism. Keire and Mulligan both agree that skating has brought together the group like a family. Mulligan expresses this directly, saying, “Skateboarding is more of a family than my own family.” (-1:26:13, Zach Mulligan) They’ve used skateboarding as a coping mechanism for not wanting to grow up but they realize it’s something that we all have to deal with. They are forced to grow up without any guidance on how to do so and that itself takes a toll. Liu learns that Mulligan has been abusive towards his girlfriend, and Kiere wants nothing to do with it. He cuts off Mulligan due to previous experience with his own father. Fast forward ten years and Zach has gotten a promotion at work while Keire has proven successful in his education and is now a professional skateboarder.

Through these films, we learn that all characters in the stories being told have something to do with escapism. Escapism obviously is escaping the unpleasant feelings or situations being dealt with firsthand. Walter Mitty uses daydreams to ward off his anxiety and PTSD, while Kiere, Zach, and Bing all use skateboarding as their escape. Escapism comes in many forms, although it is a good coping mechanism using it to completely ignore reality is extremely detrimental. Mulligan, who had used skating to escape his family before, now had a little family of his own. However, he was ignorant about how to care for them. Mulligan was an alcoholic and had become abusive towards his then girlfriend. He would neglect his family’s needs to go skating and by that time, it was too late. His girlfriend had applied for full custody of their child. At this point, the avoidance of reality wore off. This is where escapist fantasy becomes harmful. Mulligan would only retain partial custody of his child after acknowledging his mistakes. In Walter Mitty’s story, when he returns to the real world he learns that he has lost his job. Days later, he hears a familiar tune inside of a karaoke bar, and to his surprise, the film’s love interest is there singing the song from a previous daydream. Walter is stunned and thinks he is still inside a fantasy. At the end of the film we find out that not only does he like her, she also really likes him. Both of these films give good and bad examples of escapism and how they affect different people.

They have beautiful storytelling laced in

the cinematography. “Minding the Gap” takes place in Rockford, Illinois. It is beautiful in its own unique way. “Minding the Gap” is not a

professional production. It is filmed and directed by Bing Liu, who began recording when was 16 years old on a handheld video camera. His friends thought he was just taking photos for himself at first. This wasn’t unusual for him — Liu recorded everything when he was a kid. When the skaters were in their twenties, the recordings took a more personal character. The documentary starts to integrate interviews with people the skaters knew, like Kiere’s family and Mulligan’s then-girlfriend. Rockford is recorded from on top of a skateboard and it looks desolate. This produces a gentle surrealism where it is as if the skaters are the only people in the world. Although they are alone for most of the film, they are trying to get out of this town. In other words, they are trying to escape through escapism. The film is intentionally shot so as to emphasize how alone the group felt. In contrast, the interviews are shot very personally, sometimes with the subject together in a group. This helps the audience relate to the main characters and demonstrate that Rockford might not be as empty as they feel it is, which aligns with what the film sets out to tell us: escapism doesn’t always work. The skaters pushed away the people in their lives, when in fact these people cared for them and the skaters needed them too. The film was also extremely low budget. Most of the footage is homemade. This is unusual. Most films hire many people to do specialized jobs with respect to filmmaking, but this film was made by only one person. Liu was passionate about this project which is why he came back to Rockford. Films about towns like Rockford are not often made. Making films is expensive and a return on investment is less than guaranteed. As a result, people don’t know what happens in small town America. The fact that this film was made at all is artistically impressive. There are shots from the skaters childhood, from their adulthood, and all that exists in between. As a result, we are made intimately familiar with the subjects of the film, and that familiarity communicates the very different lives they might have lived from the viewer’s.

Rockford is a town in decline. Crime in Rockford is higher than in Chicago. The film blames anti-growth policies and high taxes for the state of the town. Windows are boarded up. There’s too much violent crime, and most of it is domestic abuse. Everyone in town is facing some economic trouble. Mulligan’s girlfriend would work two jobs to support their family. Kiere, himself born poor, made very little money when he was working, and had to do so for a long time so that he could accumulate enough money to leave. It is fortunate that this film exists at all. Stories about impoverished small towns rarely find mass appeal. Is this a good thing? No. These are people in awful conditions who deserve better lives than they have. They want better lives than they can get in this town. Beyond escaping interpersonal trouble, the skaters want to leave because leaving means they have a chance at escaping poverty. Rockford is a postindustrial town. The businesses that employed this town left it destitute. In many ways, the problems faced in the film are economic ones. Furthermore, the average person is ignorant of the misfortune of towns like Rockford. This film sheds light on some of society’s most vulnerable.

Why did I recommend “Minding the Gap?” The film itself deals with very real issues like domestic trauma, economic battles, and systematic racism as a whole. These are tales that tell of escapism and hardships that are meant to make you feel empowered. I recommended this film due to the relatability of its problems: you may feel like the conflicts these people are going through are similar to problems of your own. We’ve all related to an issue like these characters presented in these films, it’s what gives the audience a human connection with them. In their place, you would want to escape the struggles they’ve been put through. Kiere never had a connection or even a relationship with his father. He said it himself, “The last words I said to my dad was ‘I hate you’” (-1:01:53, Kiere Johnson). He skated to get away from his father who beat him. He loved his father, and although he was abused, Kiere still cared for his father. That was why he had conflicting opinions on his father. Mulligan just wanted to run away from school and from his family. Liu’s mother remarried when he was very young, and some of his earliest memories are of his step father beating him with his mother’s tacit approval. Kiere and Liu are both non-white, and experience racism throughout the documentary. Although some of these problems are resolved by the end of the film, some of them are not. Kiere is no longer relegated to the back room of his job and his career beyond it is successful — but racism still exists. The issues Mitty faces are the anxieties of losing our job or the inability to talk to someone we care about. These are relatable problems — who has not had family issues or worried about their job? You start to feel either empowered to fix your problem or discouraged because you don’t know what to do. You feel that you’ve faced these issues with the characters on screen. I remember watching “...Life of Walter Mitty” and connecting to him. His anxieties felt a lot like mine. I could barely get anything done and when I zoned out I would have elaborate fantasies to these far off places. He felt alone, and I felt seen. Likewise, in “Minding the Gap,” I could relate to Kiere’s issues with his father. For the longest time, my father and I didn’t speak to one another and the relationship felt strained. When watching the film, I hated that I related to the issue. I had hidden those feelings before but soon after, my feelings were brought to the surface when I saw Keire’s struggles. At that moment, I wanted to fix my situation with my father and through the years, I would make an effort to talk to him. In 2021 we have an established relationship. We call more than a few times a month and even have bonding time together. I felt like I was finally in control of my own feelings after watching these movies. This introspective documentary about young skaters just trying to find their place in the world helped me find mine. “Minding the Gap” follows three boys on their way towards self-actualization. I give you this recommendation in hopes that you too will see yourself in them and take your own steps towards your best self.

Overall, I believe that you should give this Sundance award winning film a chance. “Minding the Gap” will not only make you smile and laugh along, it will make you cry. I loved the genuine feeling behind this documentary and I’m sure you will too. The documentary informs us on many important issues. These people did not live uncommon lives, but their stories are new to us. It gives us a new perspective and that makes us more complete people.