'You have a gift for bringing joy and laughter to the world'

Bruce Almighty | Film

From Phil Connors the Weatherman in Groundhog Day, we shall now move on to have a little glimpse into Bruce Nolan in Bruce Almighty!  

Much akin to Phil Connors who is the Weatherman for the TV channel named WPBH-TV, Bruce Nolan is again, a television field reporter for Eyewitness News in WKBW-TV!

There are a few other striking similarities between the two, as well!

Remember the conversation between Phil and Rita in Groundhog Day that goes thus -

Phil Connors: I’m a god.

Rita: You are God?

Phil Connors: I’m a god, I’m not the God.

Well, in Bruce Almighty, quite interestingly, Bruce Nolan is asked by God Himself to play God!

The story in Bruce Almighty begins then, with Bruce portrayed as a greedy, self-centred and egocentric person, while his lady love Grace is shown as a positive, cheerful and caring individual! (like their counterparts in Groundhog Day)

One day, when Bruce is about to do a live report from Niagara Falls, news reaches him that his rival Evan has bagged the coveted role of anchoring the evening news.

Since he has had high hopes on the coveted post, he becomes quite vexed and dejected now! His vexation soon turns to anger. As a result, he loses his cool and blows his top, verbally abusing an elderly lady, and even the tour owner whom he was about to interview. His news channel promptly dismisses him from work.

He tries to help a homeless man who is bullied by street thugs, but quite unfortunately, it backfires on him, as the thugs beat him up mercilessly and also damage his car in the process. And a series of misfortunes follow him one by one!

Frustrated with his life, he whines that, 

‘God is a mean kid sitting on an anthill with a magnifying glass and I'm the ant he’s pulling the legs off’, 

and hence wishes that God be fired!!!

Surprisingly, and quite sooner at that, Bruce receives a text message on his pager, asking him to come to an empty warehouse where God meets him in person. 

Adding to his awe and astonishment, God offers to give Bruce His powers, for him to play God!

So enthralled and excited, Bruce assumes the god-powers on him right away, but then, he begins using them for his own silly, selfish trifles! And pretty soon, he gets weary of playing God as the whole thing proves quite messy for him.

No spoilers though! ;-)

In the course of the movie, Bruce becomes a transformed man, and by the end, he returns to his job as a field reporter, and for the first time, takes great interest in the simple stories of life for coverage!

There are quite a lot of engaging dialogues in the course of the movie. The one that struck me most was when God tells Bruce -

‘You have a divine spark. You have a gift for bringing joy and laughter to the world. I know, I created you’.

That’s indeed one of the inspiring quotables from off this movie!

And well, this engaging comedy, embellished with some memorable lessons for life, is worth watching any many times!

In short, Bruce Almighty is the story of a self-obsessed megalomaniac, who one fine day, discovers himself and from then on, sets out on the path of using his talents gifts in the service of others.

It would only be meet on my part to give a few mighty and memorable lines from Emerson, that would sure prove the icing on this delightful ‘Bruce Almighty’ cake!

Says Emerson -

The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life, that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.

There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till.

To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.

How trueee proves the legend! Ain’t he?

You may want to read more on the legendary Emerson on our back post dated 16 June 2019, HERE!