The Curious Case of Benjamin Button utilizes a diverse range of film techniques which help to communicate the idea that time is inevitable. David Fincher, the director of the film, uses both Mis en Scene and Editing techniques to provide insight into the true inevitability of time, that it will always catch up to us. Perhaps the most influential of these techniques is the prominent clock positioned in the New Orleans train station. It is quickly established at the beginning of the film that this clock foreshadows the birth of Benjamin Button and can be depicted as a representation of his lifespan. Although Benjamin ages backwards, the clock moves in the right direction regardless of the numbers on it. When the clock is finally taken down in 2002, Daisy foreshadows what is to come, that Benjamin’s time is running out. Because time had changed so much since the clock was originally erected, it had to be removed to make room for newer and better things, and thus a digital clock was put in its place. The numbers on the new clock are continuously changing and each new minute there is a new set of numbers being featured on it. Yet the antique clock fashioned by Mr Gateau always stays the same, except for the moving of its hands which wind around the outer edge of the clock. Regardless of the numbers, both clocks show that time moves on in the right direction regardless of what era it is. In the Spring of 2003, when Benjamin dies in Daisy’s arms, the clock continues to tick on in the same fashion without him showing that although he is gone, time will continue to move forward for those who are alive, so that their story may continue. Although Benjamin has lived his story there are plenty of those still alive that must live theirs including Daisy, and thus time, represented through the clock must tick on as it did for Benjamin.
The end montage features the many people who died before Benjamin, they all played a part in his life and time still ticked on even after they were gone. Your story is made up of all of the people that you experienced life with and even after they are gone time will continue on for you so that you can finish your story just as they did. There is so much diversity in life that everyone has their own story regardless of who they are. Time moves forwards so that those who live can continue their story until it too, is their time to go. The world does not revolve around us and eventually, we all must pass, so that we can make room for better and newer things. Just as the clock in the trains station was removed to make room for a better model, we all must eventually pass to make room for new life upon Earth. Time eventually stops for all of us but continues on for those who live. We all play a part in each others story. However hard we try to go back in time it will eventually catch up to all of us just as it did for those before us, it is the circle of life, we live then we die and the events in between are dictated by time. Time remembers us just as those who live do but eventually, all those who knew us will die out and the memories of us will be forgotten. When the clock is finally put away in the basement floor it is remembered by those who walk the train station every day until one day all of the people die out and it is lost in the fabric of time. Each person is different in their own ways just as the two clocks are, no person greater than another, just different and we must expire to make room for more diversity. When the flood waters reach the clock gathering dust in the basement, it continues to tick on in the same fashion that it has for the last 100 years or so. Because the clock is of such an old fashion it has the durability to cope with the clock waters reaching it. Because it is not digitalized, it ticks on even under the harshest circumstances, just as time will continue on even after the worst of events such as Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
You cannot escape it
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