How Tom Hanks Made Us Cry Over a Volleyball in Cast Away

How Tom Hanks Made Us Cry Over a Volleyball in Cast Away

Only Tom Hanks has the talent to make a volleyball a beloved character like he did with Wilson in Cast Away.

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How Tom Hanks Made Us Cry Over a Volleyball in Cast Away

Robert Zemeckis’ Cast Away has a very simple premise: Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) survives a plane crash and gets stranded on a deserted island and must survive living on his own in a harsh new reality. Chuck is the only person on screen for most of the movie, meaning that there are several scenes where there is no dialogue at all as he adjusts to his new surroundings. Understandably, it’s very lonely surviving on an island by yourself, but that doesn’t mean Chuck never had company while he was out there.

Various FedEx packages wash up on his island from the plane that Chuck was on, and one of them contains a Wilson volleyball that Chuck ends up painting a face on and naming Wilson. For the rest of Chuck’s time on the island, Wilson becomes his best friend and talking companion. In any other scenario, a grown man talking to a ball would make him crazy. But as the film goes on, Wilson ends up becoming a key supporting character in Chuck’s story that one can’t help but get emotional over.

How Tom Hanks Made Us Cry Over a Volleyball in Cast Away

It all boils down to Hanks’ performance as Chuck and how he interacts with Wilson. Despite Wilson not being real, both he and the film still treat the ball like a real person since there is no one else around. Because of this, Chuck has someone to share his experiences with and the viewers are able to accept Wilson as a real character. And just like Chuck, the audience seeks another presence on the island in order to break up the loneliness and boredom of one person being stranded.

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The effect Wilson has on Chuck and the audience is shown in the scene where Chuck gets angry with Wilson and throws him out of his cave home. After realizing what he did, Chuck immediately regrets his decision and goes outside to “save” Wilson and apologize to him. Since viewers experience everything from Chuck’s point of view, they feel the anguish in his voice when he believes he accidentally “killed” his only friend. And in that same way, they root for Chuck to reunite with Wilson since there is no one else out there for him.

But the most emotional part of their friendship comes when Wilson ends up floating away into the ocean after Chuck builds a raft to sail away from the island. When Chuck is unable to swim out and save his friend, he is left heartbroken and cries uncontrollably. Hanks’ sorrowful performance really drives home the idea that Wilson was not only real to Chuck but an important aspect in his struggle for survival.

And since Wilson’s departure is immediately followed by Chuck’s rescue, it also represents how this part of Chuck’s life is over and that he needs to come back to the real world. Wilson fulfilled his purpose in giving Chuck a real island friend, and it was time for Wilson to go and for Chuck to move on in a painful but necessary moment. But even with that being the case, one can’t help but tear up when Wilson departs.

Link Source : https://www.cbr.com/cast-away-tom-hanks-wilson-crying/

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