Pay it forward

Liberty Mutual's current ad campaign is terrific. Of course, it's marketing and thus not something I would ever take on faith about the company. But their ad agency created a good message whether it's true about Liberty Mutual or not.

Altruism can infect other people who witness it - and what a glorious infection to have. These ads pointedly show a diverse mix of people learning from strangers to be better people. The rednecks in the early model Chevy pickup belie their stereotype, and I really like that.

On a similar theme, the movie Pay It Forward had great potential, but its director, Mimi Leder likes bittersweet endings and ambiguous morals. I don't blame her - Hollywood is filled with Potemkin endings tacked onto stories that need to be hard. But Pay It Forward is the opposite; it's a bitter ending tacked onto a plot that demands perseverance of its characters, gets it, and then exacts the worst blood sacrifice.

Leder did need to back away from the saccharin possibilities, but she backed waaay too far away. Killing Haley Joel Osment's character in the final sequence whipsawed me to the conclusion that the rest of the story was a happy lie. The movie needed to acknowledge that altruistic examples couldn't solve problems easily, but an assault could have done that without the self-abnegating death of hope.