Changing Lanes -

Directed by Roger Michell

Keep constant guard over the actions of your life. - The Rule of St. Benedict (Rule 4)

Being equal to the hindrances that confront us is no easy task, especially in an urban milieu where speed, anger, impatience, and incivility prevail. In this movie, a series of events find two men in a situation of jeopardy and great vulnerability; however, instead of taking responsibility for their actions they choose to enter into a vengeful battle with each other, doing more harm than what ought to be good. Gavin Baneck, a successful New York attorney, is in a rush to file a power of appointment, which will prove that the deceased client signed his foundation over to Baneck's law firm. While changing lanes in the FDR, he collides with another car, belonging to an insurance salesman, Doyle Gibson, who is also in a rush to a hearing in order to try to gain custody of his children and to prevent his estranged wife from taking them to Oregon. Baneck tries to brush Gibson off with a blank check, thereby disobeying the due process required by law. After Gibson refuses to accept the check and voices his desire to "do the right thing", that is, filing a police report and insurance claim, Baneck strands Gibson, telling him, "better luck next time," ignoring the latters request for a lift towards a destination which turned out to be similar. After arriving to the court late, Gibson learns that it proceeded without him, consequently not going in his favor. Several themes are explored by this masterpiece, but a certain favorite, one that I will never forget, is the irony, a good example being the two students fresh out of law school whom Baneck interviews apparently for the position of articled clerkship with the firm. The young man especially says he would like to be a lawyer because he believes people are by nature good, and that conflict arises from historical forces, the law being

there as a "buffer", and him believing strongly in fairness and justice. He is given the job by Baneck, who invites him to see for himself just how the law is in actual practice. Certainly, it is very curious as to how extremely different the two characters' days would have been had only Baneck cared to ask Gibson where he was going that morning, which is the same place as he, to give him a friendly lift. Another focal point of this masterpiece, pertaining to falsifying the power of appointment and using it to collect the money due to the principal and converting it to his benefit, is an apparent manifestation of a lawyer unfit to manage the legal business of others, unworthy of public confidence and devoid of high sense of morality and fair dealing expected and required of the member of the legal profession. Society has entrusted to the legal profession the administration of law and the dispensing of justice, and this trust demands lawyers to be at the forefront in the observance and maintenance of the law and the preservation of its democratic institutions and liberties. However, lacking proper ethics and sense of morality, as emphasized by the Benedictine rule inhibiting the involvement of fraud, dishonesty or greed in the actions of ones life, the practice leads not to upholding the nobility of the cause it represents, but to the death of their very souls. Lastly, but certainly not the least in the themes of this piece, is the anchor that faith in God provides for the members of society. A lawyer, no matter how exalted, must not forget this faith, for the justice he seeks to administer and uphold is but an instrument that the Almighty one designed for the betterment of the world he created. The law is not just in the letter of doing what is lawful and permissible, but more in the spirit of what is just and honorable. Certainly, it is a pleasant thought that must never be forgotten even in the passage of time and the successes it brings.