The Legend of Will Smith

by Rick Devine

Will Smith has had an illustrious movie career with an array of different roles. He was himself in a television show, a cowboy, a gay man, fought aliens three times, solved a rubix cube, and played God. That’s right Will Smith has played God or more specifically a god. A lot of people overlook the film The Legend of Bagger Vance (00). I myself didn’t understand it the first time I saw it when I was younger. I myself took him to be a guardian angel of sorts, but it goes a bit deeper than that. Will Smith represents the god Krishna and Matt Damon is supposed to be Arjuna from The Bhagavad-Gita.
The Bhagavad-Gita is somewhat of the Hindu bible. Although it is a story, in it the people of the Hindu religion are taught their lessons and how to live a good life based on the speech and advice given throughout the book. Arjuna is a prince who is being driven to the battlefield to fight in a war. Along the way he discovers that the enemies he is fighting are in fact his own relatives. He wants to back out and not fight, deciding it is not right to slay one’s own family members. At this time the driver reveals himself to be his god Krishna. Krishna starts to deliver advice and ideas that are meant to guide Arjuna in this difficult time. Krishna tells him that it is ok to slay his family because they are in fact evildoers and punishment should be delivered regardless of who you are in this world. He goes on to say that just because he kills them on earth does not mean he is ending their “life” because or bodies are just our vessels that hold us in this world. So hen he kills them he delivers their souls to the afterlife and only punishing them for what they have done here on earth. Arjuna eventually goes on to fight in the battle.
As for the film The Legend of Bagger Vance the story is similar, but not close in all respects. The film opens with a man named Rannulph Junah (R. Junah = Arjuna) who is a local golfing legend and when the first World War hits he is drafted. Junah leads the men of the town overseas, which is the first parallel, these men all look up to him and consider him a hero. They are not family by any means but they mean a lot to Junah.
They all die but him in the war and he feels that he is responsible, he like Arjuna feels as if he killed his family. Junah then goes into hiding, until brought out to play a golf match to save Savannah during the Great Depression. He is convinced to play by Bagger Vance (Bhagavan aka Krishna = BAGar VANce) who tells Junah that the future is all that matters. After a series of similar speeches delivered in the Bhagavad-Gita, Junah goes on to tie the other two golf pros, get over the fact that he “killed” those men, and lives a happy life.
There are many similarities as much as there are differences, but the similarities are there. The names as previously pointed out are a dead give away that these characters in this film are meant to be an alternate interpretation of the Arjuna and Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita. The rest of the similarities are not present until almost half way through the movie. Although Bagger is already present and all knowing there is nothing there that ties him to the god Krishna, which is understandable because they don’t want to make it too preachy because they need to keep all different kinds of audiences to see the film. The idea of Yoga which is presented in the Bhagavad-Gita is similar to what Bagger teaches the young boy and Junah about focusing. He tells them to focus on the task at hand, focus on yourself, and focus on the earth. Also when they are in the locker room Bagger says, “The Junah you was, you ain’t never gonna be again,” which can be compared to the idea that Krishna gives that our bodies on Earth do not follow us into the afterlife. He says, “When a sensible man ceases to see different identities due to different material bodies and he sees how beings are expanded everywhere, he attains to the Brahman conception.” But I would say the biggest similarity is when Baggar and Junah are in the woods. The idea in the movie is that Junah’s men were killed in a location that looked similar and that idea has hindered him ever since. Baggar helps him get out of the woods, come to terms with nothing he did was wrong and change his life for the better. Krishna delivers similar hope to Arjuna, both dealing with war, by telling him that he must slay the enemey, its not wrong and its his duty and afterward he will live a happy life. Neither figure stays in the end to help them win their final “battle.”
The differences betweens the two are much greater. Obvioulsy the Bhagavad-gita is not about golf. Also, Baggar doesn’t, at least to myself, come across as Krishna. Krishna is more of a war pusher and has a somewhat stronger and more blunt way of saying things. Where Bagger seems gentle and kind. That is not to say that Krishna is bad, Baggar just seems more like a Christian figure. Which could be the case because the filmmakers were more than likely of Christian and Jewish backgrounds.