The Age of Adaline: A Reflection

The Age of Adaline is an earnest tale about a woman (Blake Lively) whose mysterious affliction is to stay 29 forever, but the lavish storytelling can't make up for a preposterous premise.

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When it comes to movies, there are several that I consider being my favorite. But lately, I am drawn to the movie entitled, The Age of Adaline played by the Hollywood actress Blake Lively.

What could be in this movie that makes me hooked into it? Is it because I am captivated about movies having a plot concerning time traveling and science fiction? Or it is just the movie itself? Well, you won’t unless you see it for yourself.

Directed by Lee Toland Krieger, The Age of Adaline is a romantic drama about a woman who stopped aging when she was involved in a car crash in the 1930s. After living alone her whole life, she meets a man who might change her life forever.

A blog entitled, This is Barry explained the movie in a short and precise way which could immediately explicate the plot of the movie. "After being struck by lighting and not becoming toast, a mysteriously un-aging Adaline lives her life running from one identity to another to avoid a lab-rat situation. She happens to fall in love with a young William (who is on the verge of proposing to her) but ditches him because of her condition, and with a heavy heart continues with her life of escape. Forty years later, Adaline falls in love with Ellis who, coincidentally, turns out to be William’s son. After telling William her truth, she again runs for it, has a change of heart, turns around only to be hit by a truck, is defibrillated back to life, and regains her ability to age again. Adaline happily hooks up with Ellis leaving William to somehow come to terms with this convoluted state of existence. Throughout, an overly detailed explanation of highly implausible science presented by a narrator removes the need to apply one’s mind or write an explanatory article".

Age of Adaline centers around the impact age can have on our ability to love. What would you do if everyone else grew old around you and you did not? Can you love? Will you be loved? The main focus is on Adaline and the three men she has loved, and the one constant in her life; her daughter Flemming.

We’ve all no doubt heard the expression “Life is what you make of it,” and that simple statement effectively summarizes the essence of conscious creation. Much of the time, however, we lose sight of that sentiment, especially as we become preoccupied with the minutiae of daily existence. That’s particularly true when we feel like we constantly have to scramble to prop up the appearances of a reality sorely in need of alteration. We need to take a wider view, to embrace our capacity for change and our ability to rewrite our beliefs for manifesting a greater sense of satisfaction and fulfillment. It would be in Adaline’s best interests if she learned from those lessons. And, in many cases, the same could be said for the rest of us.