Rules to Live By

"Happy to be alive under anycircumstances? Is that your point?"

Dr. Wilbur Larch, the gruff but saintly abortionist in the film The Cider House Rules, as he attempts to intimidate his protégé into actually performing abortions

"If Hollywood were to offer us a movie in which a father, guilty of incest with his daughter, was treated as a dignified, even sympathetic character, would anyone be offended? Would anyone notice? And if this same movie treated abortion as a sacramental rite of passage, akin to confirmation or bar mitzvah, would anyone notice that? Apparently not, judging from the reaction to the film version of John Irving's Cider House Rules."

Paul W. McNellis, S.J., America magazine, April 1

Imagine, if you can, being at my desk, minding my own business, and out of the blue receiving a call from (of all people) the New York Times(!) to write a response/rebuttal to the comments of John Irving, who the night before had thanked the Abortion Establishment as he received his Oscar. Excuse me?

Affection for unlimited abortion is to the Times what love for hard drink is to an alcoholic - - addictive, boundless, and highly intoxicating. So what if in receiving an Academy Award for best screenplay adaptation of his pro-abortion novel The Cider House Rules Irving thanks the Academy for honoring a film that dealt with abortion, adds thanks to Disney/Miramax "for having the courage to make this movie in the first place," and (barely pausing for breath) finishes with thanks to "everyone, Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Rights [Action] League." What's the big deal?

Award winner praises Hollywood for " courage" for dealing with abortion (in a pro-abortion way), and then plants a figurative kiss on the brows of Gloria Feldt of PPFA and Kate Michelman of NARAL - - this is news? And yet the Times felt...whatever it was and decided to ask a pro-lifer to respond.

The individual first contacted couldn't meet the have- the-piece-done-in-two-hours deadline and asked me to pinch hit. After initial trepidation, I realized this was an almost unparalleled opportunity. Since almost everyone has access to the web today, may I simply suggest you go to Today's News & Views (www.nrlc.org.) for March 27- April 3 for an in-depth examination of the many dimensions of a movie that also brought an Oscar to Michael Caine for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of the abortionist Wilbur Larch?

The setting for The Cider House Rules is World War II. Larch is the paterfamilias of a rural Maine orphanage. Pregnant, unmarried girls come there.

Larch says abortion and delivery are, for him, merely alternative ways of "being of use." Irving's novel from which he adapted the screenplay assures us that Larch is a compassionate man. Better yet, he is absolutely non-judgmental; he never " interferes." As Larch put it, "I do not even recommend," adding, "I just give them what they want: an abortion or an orphan."

But as Paul W. McNellis astutely pointed out in his review for America magazine, "In the only scene that compares these alternatives - - juxtaposed in such a way that we can't help making the comparison - - a woman who gives birth leaves the orphanage an emotional and physical wreck, while a woman whose child is aborted recovers amazingly quickly and even becomes closer to the father."

For unexplained reasons, Homer has never been adopted and becomes the son Larch never had. Larch wants him to carry on the "family business" and patiently teaches him how to deliver babies and to kill them. But Homer refuses to actually perform abortions. Why?

Most likely he intuits that had his unwed mother chosen otherwise, Homer would have wound up in the incinerator. (Larch is so ticked at Homer's refusal to perform abortions, he makes Homer dispose of the aborted fetuses.)

You can, of course, see the moral of the story coming a mile away: Homer must dispose of his scruples so he can "grow" to be a man like his surrogate father and dispose of the kids with a clean conscience (if not clean hands).

Homer decides to see the world and leaves the orphanage with Wally and Wally's now child-less girlfriend, Candy (Larch has just aborted Candy's baby) to work in Wally's mother's apple orchard. Wally then goes off to war and Homer becomes involved with Candy.

As you would suspect, Irving stacks the deck. Homer aborts the child-by-incest of a young woman who works at the apple orchard. The tools of the abortionist, given to Homer by Larch as a "useful" birthday present, finally are put to use. In the movie's signature dialogue, Homer tells the incest victim he is "a doctor...I can help."

As McNellis puts it, "This film now tells us that abortion can be a coming-of-age experience for the abortionist, provided only that he has the requisite skills. This is the most sinister aspect of The Cider House Rules: To become a real man [and real physician!], just say yes to abortion. Only after performing an abortion can Homer return to the orphanage as the qualified and worthy successor to Dr. Larch." (Something we explore at some length on the web is the significance of that fact that Larch, who is addicted to sniffing ether, dies of a drug overdose.)

Homer has now completed his spiritual odyssey. Like a modern-day Ulysses, Homer returns home, having finally drown out the siren call of conscience.

Three quick concluding points. First, killing helpless babies represents "growth" only in the twisted minds of people like PPFA, NARAL, and John Irving.

Second, I'm told a significant percentage of the audience at the Academy Awards did not wildly applaud Irving, but remained silent, certainly something that did not come across on television.
Third, over and over again, the critics, who loved the film, told us that The Cider House Rules was a "coming-of-age" film. Taking that as my point of departure, I proposed in my New York Times op-ed a coming of age on the part of the film industry.

In its depiction of pro-lifers, I asked, might not Hollywood somehow find a way to portray the Movement in all its richness, complexity, and love for both mother and unborn child? I no longer believe such a film is beyond the realm of possibility.

And were that request to be honored, it would truly represent a genuine example of coming of age and a real profile in courage.

dave andrusko [dha1245@juno.com]

(Be sure to check out "Today's News & Views" at www.nrlc.org.)