Every Time We Say Goodbye (1986)

"Damn it, why can't you look terrible? I've been out walking the streets trying to convince myself I wasn't in love with you and I come back here and you're barefoot and you're adorable."

Tom Hanks is pretty well known for being the penultimate nice guy in Hollywood, which is a tough thing to be in an industry as cutthroat as filmmaking is. He's good to his fans, always happy to pose for a picture or have one of his famous lines quoted back to him. He even jokingly (or not, fingers crossed) pledged to run for Vice President of the United States with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as the presidential candidate. A cursory Google search yields countless stories of the charming, funny, endearing things he's done. Even if, for whatever reason, you don't care for his movies, it's hard not to admire the man himself for his character. I've always wondered what kind of person could possibly not like Tom Hanks. Tonight, I found out.

Every Time We Say Goodbye is the story of David, a U.S. Army soldier temporarily stationed in Jerusalem during WWII who meets Sarah, a Sephardic Jewish girl. I'd heard the term before, but to be perfectly frank, I had no idea what it meant, aside from the fact that it was a flavor of Judaism (is it disrespectful to refer to a religion as having flavors? If so, my bad, sorry about that). As it turns out, the Sephardic Jews were a people who lived on the Iberian peninsula until the Spanish monarchs decided that Catholicism was the only acceptable religion and decreed in 1492 (seems oppression was running rampant on both sides of the pond back then) that any Jews in Spain must convert, be exiled, or face execution. Portugal followed suit in 1495, with the fun twist of blocking all roads leaving the country, which essentially gave the Jews the choice to convert or die. Well, then. 

I honestly had no idea there was such a thing as Hispanic Jews, so I marveled at how those cultures blend together. While modern times are far more progressive, many religions and ethnicities tend to prefer to marry amongst themselves even today, if only because their shared beliefs and culture make them more compatible. In the days of World War II, however, it would have been all but unthinkable for people of different religions and races to socialize. This is plainly evident when David meets Sarah's family, and bless his naive little heart, he doesn't quite understand why a tight-knit and traditional Hispanic Jewish family wouldn't want their daughter fraternizing with a white Protestant soldier.

These people do not like Tom Hanks.

Hanx, however, is unflappable in his yearning for Sarah, and his persistence wears down her reservations, which results in a lot of clandestine meetings. Sarah is, as any good daughter would be, heavily conflicted between her devotion to her family and her burgeoning love for the gentle dark-haired American with the winning smile. The more I think about it, the more I realize that Hanx was absolutely perfect for this role. It would be so easy to side with Sarah's family in their disapproval of David if there were any less of a likable quality to him. As it is, I found myself getting seriously angry with the lot of them. But being your standard issue modern white Anglo-Saxon Protestant myself, I'm so far removed from the time and the culture that I had to just grit my teeth and acknowledge my own ignorance in such matters. As a matter of fact, it was my Hispanic Catholic husband, who in his own military service has naturally experienced more cultures than I have, who had to talk me off the ledge. Ironic.

The love story in and of itself is very sweet. Cristina Marsillach is captivating as Sarah, and her wide eyes and striking features remind me just a bit of a Spanish Audrey Tautou, whom we'll see a bit farther down the line when we get to The Da Vinci Code. Her list of film credits seems surprisingly short given her promising performance, but she may have simply decided to step back from the cameras in order to assume her role as director of the Marsillach Acting Academy in Madrid.

For all the heart in this film, I wish it had had just a bit more meat. For a story set during World War II, there is scant mention at all of the war itself, no subplots to be found and little to no development of any characters other than the star-crossed lovers (even Romeo and Juliet had a comic relief), which leaves the whole plot feeling just a bit tedious. I would have loved to have seen a battle of some sort, perhaps a brush with death for David, compelling Sarah, who had previously sworn him off out of respect for her family's wishes, to hurry to his bedside and profess her love. As it stands, the fate of the couple is left to the imagination.

That's not to say that I haven't taken anything from this film; far from it. I've gained just a bit of insight into the Sephardi and their struggles, and I'm fascinated with the idea of how the Spanish and Jewish cultures, each of which are rich and storied on their own, intermingle. And there's something to be said for a man so impeccable in his character and steadfast in his intentions that he manages to withstand the opposition that comes from a culture so steeped in tradition in order to win over the woman he loves. Every Time We Say Goodbye is a tale of love and diversity in a time of turmoil and conflict, which is sadly all too appropriate today. Jerusalem had David then, and, thank God we've got Tom Hanks now.