The Cruise (Bennett Miller, 1998) Sex and the City

[JWray]

Timothy “Speed” Levitch suffers from a disassociation with people. He doesn’t seem to have a really significant connection with any other human. He compensates this short-coming with an obsession with the city.

The only real connection he has with anything is with the city. The city to him is like a person and the buildings are people too. He looks to the city to fulfill him with the pleasures that most people get from interaction with others. At the beginning of the documentary his lack of ability to maintain a relationship with a woman is brought out in a “divorce” metaphor. He doesn’t have actual fights and actual fall-outs with real people, so she compensates by having them with New York City. His metaphorical sexual obsession with the terracotta building demonstrates his lack of an actual sex life. The “to – ” conversations he has at the end are told to the Brooklyn bridge, not the people. People have stopped listening to him, but the buildings in the city will always listen to him. Understanding is always being supplied by the buildings. He gets a rush not from other people, but from interacting with the city like when he spins around in circles between the Twin Towers.

His minimal contact with humans stems from past, failed relationships. All the relationships with people he talks about are bad relationships. He simply doesn’t have an interest in people anymore. The viewer never sees his friends, if he has any. When he crashes at his “friends” place, the viewer doesn’t see the friend and neither does he talk about the friend. Whenever he has a conversation with a real person, he is awkward, but when he is alone, talking to the camera, he suddenly becomes a modern Shakespeare. He never speaks eloquently when he is talking to somebody else, but when he is pouring his soul out, he uses a vernacular that is usually only reserved for the elite. The communication breakdown he has with the two Spanish ladies is a metaphor for his interactions with people. He can’t get a connection with other people, and in the end, he loses them.

The reason why he does the tour is it is between him and the buildings. The people don’t really pay attention and aren’t really a part of the process. It’s mainly him talking about what he loves most, the buildings of New York City.

[aburns]

At times it feels as if even Speed’s relationship with New York isn’t the most desirable type of relationship. The movie opens with Speed quoting the song “But Not For Me” singing that “Although I can’t dismiss / The memory of her kiss / I guess she’s not for me”. He then goes on to describe New York in a series of blocks, naming off more misfortunes- deaths, alcoholism, loneliness- than good fortunes. Later, we hear his rendition of his divorce from the city the previous winter. I noticed that he also favored the quote about New York was the only place where that particular character (I can’t remember who it was) could be alone. Throughout this movie, Speed seemed to feel that the city was actively focusing its emotions and ideas on him instead of him focusing his emotions on it. New York wanted a divorce from him, not the other way around. And in that sense, the city became a living entity. Speed felt that the city was judging him in the same way that the tourists and locals were(notice the door man smirking in the background as Speed pep talks the leaves on the sidewalk). And this led me to believe that the people and the city were one in the same.

I felt that the city and the people in the city acted as sort of an anti-cruise for Speed. He loved them and respected them (or at the very least, respected the city) but he felt as if they still acted as an anti-cruise in his life. The city blocks hindered his “cruising” and his relationships with actual people. But he did sort of accept the anti-cruise as a helpful thing. They cruise and the anti-cruise happen together. The anti-cruise is necessary in this so that we may appreciate the cruise even more.

[mhollis]

He is Carrie Bradshaw!

[ADeMeo]

To me, Speed in "The Cruise" serves as a reminder that sometimes having incredible intelligence can be socially isolating, and make one sad and lonely. You see his tourists getting on the bus, expecting to have a vanilla, let's-see-the-sights type of tour. Instead, their faces look bemused as they listen to the young man with a reedy voice rhapsodize about all the smart, famous people who lived in the city, and how sad and desperate some of them were.

I was struck by the similarity between Timothy "Speed" Levich and the footage of young Bob Dylan in Martin Scorsese's documentary, "No Direction Home". Of course, they both looked similar, but they also had a detached way of interacting with others, as if they were never fully comfortable talking to most people. Both men shine when reciting their respective poetry; not to one specific person, but for anyone who cares to listen.

Levich's appreciation for the little details in life most take for granted were like those of Maude's. The Cruise was almost like taking a busload of Harolds, or Enids, or maybe even a busload of the shallow background characters from Ghost World or Wall-E, and allowing them to see the world around them in a way they did not expect. It takes someone memorable, someone very intelligent, to open such people's eyes. The fictional Maude, and the real-life characters (because I think real life has the best characters anyway) of Timothy "Speed" Levich and Bob Dylan all have that ability.

[cvranizan]

It is pretty clear that Speed is not like most people and does have some difficulty connecting with others but I wouldn't call him a complete failure on that level. I think he is fine at interacting with others, he makes them laugh and holds fairly normal conversations with the people on the bus and the drivers, but I would agree he lacks the ability to form a strong, meaningful connection with anyone else. I don't know if he is using the city to compensate for this like you say or if his peculiar obsession with the city led to his inability to associate with others. His failed relationships in the past did not seem like they would be the cause of his disinterest in people and his acquired passion for the city. He ranted about some pretty insignificant things going all the way back to his childhood, not too much about serious relationship issues, but I may be recalling incorrectly. If his love for the city is just a way for him to cope with his relationship struggles, well that is an interesting coping mechanism.

I find his love for the city to be like some form of urban transcendentalism. Transcendentalists believe in becoming one with nature for God or some form of an almighty soul presides in nature. For Speed, nature is replaced by man-made objects and massive structures. He believes the divine is in the composition and aesthetics of New York's architecture. That is why he feels this need to become one with it and becomes incredibly disillusioned when he loses this sense of connectedness. He also demonstrates aspects of transcendentalism like living simply, thinking intuitively and reflects the beliefs of Henry David Thoreau in respect to his disdain towards government or authoritative restrictions, which he calls the anti-cruise.

I wonder if Speed has ever actually been in a real nature setting. He understands and points out that the entire park is fake and that may be the closest he has come to a natural landscape. I just have a feeling he has not traveled outside of New York too much.

[aslack]

For me, I feel that the relationships that Timothy has with the buildings, is both essential for his job, but also for the benefit of the other people. I do see that his relationships with people are rather lacking, but on the same token he makes small relationships with every person that enters his bus.

Through out the documentary there are defining connections between the buildings that he loves and the people that lived in them. I believe that he not only felt the buildings were in a relationship with him, but also the people that used to live in them. He talks about all the famous people that once or still live in the city as if they were his friends. I feel that this disassociation with friendship is the root cause of his obsession with the city and his job. This is in no way bad, but the way that he is presented throughout the film is a direct correlation to this problem.

As for the relationship with actual people, I feel that he is always making small relationships when he takes people on the tours. It is merely a fact of life that when one is put into a situation like a tour bus, one must make small connections with others to be able to talk to them and function properly. I feel that he does this with each person, so that he can make each person love the city just as much as he does.

[kwallace]

The cruise; the anticruise? That is the question. It seems like we are about to dive right into Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy. Listening to “Speed” talk was like sitting down with Shakespeare or Oscar Wilde. He was fascinatingly articulate; it honestly felt like I was watching a dictionary speak. Having that type of awesome intellect must be a true struggle to find someone who can challenge you as an intellectual. It seems as if a large part of finding fulfillment as a human is being able to make meaningful relationships with other humans. However, Speed establishes a relationship with his city and stomping grounds. This reminds me of the relationship that I have currently been reading about in my Philosophy and Cultural Diversity class where the connection to a place is just as important as to people. For Native Americans, culture stems from interconnectedness with all the aspects of ones’ power and place. To be a “person” according to philosophers Deloria and Wildcat, means more than just human. A “person” is anything that can act with agency, whether it is plants, animals, tools, and constructions. If we look at the epistemic views of this philosophy and not from the Aristotelian view of persons belonging only to the notion of humanity, than Speed has established meaningful relations with his place and allows his identity to stem from there. It is difficult, though, to keep one’s humanity when you can’t establish any type of healthy relationship with another human being. Alas, Speed can play with flaccid plants though, and if he feels a relationship to that, or the terra cotta spectacles, he can find himself with some semblance of an identity.

[SSilverst]

Timothy “Speed” Levitch’s unconventional love for the city and its intricacies in The Cruise does not stem from an inability to form adequate human relationships. He is a philosopher who chooses to present himself with the opportunity to maintain a relationship with something other than human, because the way that he sees life, relationships do not need to be tethered to the normalcy of human-to-human interaction. Speed described the depth of his connection to the city and nature by saying that he not only wants to appreciate the flower, but he wants the flower to appreciate him. He sees the world as full of reciprocating souls, unlike most, who only believe humans, or sometimes animals, are capable of reciprocating emotion. This is evident when Speed has a moment with the terra cotta sculpturing on the building across the street. He finds the design and fluidity of it as a sexual display, and he shares an intimate connection to it, which to the audience is appropriately comedic.

Speed’s peculiarity is a source of the comedy and enjoyment of The Cruise, but the documentary is a brief insight into his philosophy. He is constantly referring everything to his job by the term “cruising” which is a metaphor for his life. He explains that every loop on his job is another life cycle with the ups and downs that accompany. This philosophy maintains that he should live every one of these lives to the fullest, and he attempts to. Speed says that each loop presents him with the opportunity to improve upon the last, which if applied as a lifecycle implies that he is living each day to the fullest. Likewise, he sees the anti-cruise as both a common physical hindrance on his loops and as a common obstacle he must overcome in his life. The anti-cruise is always, in some form, accompanying the cruise, and it is everywhere. The cruise and the anti-cruise cannot exist without the other, though, for it is the anti-cruise that sustains the indispensability of the cruise.

As for Speed’s disdain for the grid system, he sees it as a laceration on Manhattan, an unnatural way to cram as many people in as possible with no regard for the way the island truly flows. It is composed of an indistinguishable series of right angles, and this may be the reason that Speed looks past the linear composition of the city and sees the individual buildings as beautiful. Speed is in opposition with what the grid stands for, which is a homogenization of space that is inherent with any major city in the United States. San Francisco, Portland, Chicago, and Manhattan were all designed with the same linear blueprint and have the same general appearance. Speed finds beauty in his rendition of the grid plan, Manhattan, in the same way he describes how he sees civilization as a plant, very structured and congruent and therefore everyone is a carbon copy of everyone else. He explains how if this is a true sentiment then he is happy knowing that he is attempting to break out to exhibit a form of individuality, even if it is a hopeless venture.

[tbrooks]

First off, I agree with your title. Speed, in “ The Cruise” does have some similarities with the plot of sex and the city. Also, I agree with the person who said he resembles Carrie Bradshaw. Carrie Bradshaw writes her own column about her past and present relationships. She communicates through her computer, allowing herself to ask any questions she may have or just talk about anything she wants. This is her way of opening up, just like Speed opens up to the buildings. The buildings will not judge him, just like Carrie’s computer won’t judge her. Sometimes it is easier to open up to something that will not respond, sure, it is not very helpful, but it feels good to just let emotions out. No matter how intelligent a person may be, opening up is never an easy thing. Especially, if in the past a person has been hurt by another before. Carrie takes her frustration out on her computer; she knows that it won’t hurt her in the end. Just like Speed opens up to the buildings, he knows they will always be there, longer than any other person could be. Through all the hurt, it makes one just shut down. Intelligence, I believe, has nothing to do with being socially awkward. It all depends on a person’s past and how they were brought up that determines the reasons for them being socially awkward. It is hard to open up to people, especially if you don’t trust someone. Carrie Bradshaw lives her life through a computer, but in the end, teaches her audience that the world is not a scary place, leaving the past behind and focusing on the future is important. It allows her audience to understand that once they accomplish that first step, the world doesn’t seem like a scary place. Timothy “Speed” Levich is a very memorable character as well, that finds his own happiness, but at the same time is a character that has the ability to open people’s eyes.

[A. Bengel]

I think Timothy Speed Levitch views the cruise as the human ability to take in his surroundings and appreciate the sensations all around. This message seems particularly ironic coming from a city like New York, where everyone bustles from destination from destination without stopping to smell the roses, which Levitch literally does. This is why Speed operates “The Cruise”. This bus tour is designed to offer only a passing glimpse of the city, a surface rendering, an ephemeral, passing view for the tourists to shake off as soon as they get off. But Speed chooses rather to take his “audience” inside the buildings and show that every aspect of New York life possesses an interesting history.

On the other hand, the anti-Cruise represents everything that restricts our ability to live. From the yellow tape which tells us where we can’t walk, to the entire judicial system, which locks people like Levitch up for years, the anti-Cruise is the system that attempts to categorize and control every aspect of our lives.

This is why I don’t see Speed’s relationship with New York City as being an entirely loving one. While he truly appreciates the old architecture and the originality of certain places like the Brooklyn Bridge and the Flatiron Building, he rebels against the grid structure, which completely systemizes the environment and the feel of his city. Manhattan’s block structure has been this way since long before Levitch’s time, so this is no new realization for him.
At times Levitch is even repulsed by the coldness of the city. His reference to Greta Garbo’s statement that New York was the only place she could go to be alone carries a clearly ironic tone because NYC is among the most densely populated cities in the world. Levitch expresses awe at the actual dimensions of the island, which simply don’t seem ample to support such a large number of people.

So Speed’s relationship with his city has been , to say the least, rocky. But what we can take from his cruise is that, good or bad, New York City is an interesting place with an undeniable historical significance, and that it is as much alive as any of us.

[whughes]

Speed’s life is basically a never ending road of circles and stops. Speed wakes up every day gets on his bus with a new crowd of tourists and shows of the city of New York. After the tour is over a new crowd of people board the bus and Speed travels through the streets of New York again and again. Nothing in his life changes it’s almost as if time stands still for this one man. Speed is quite the enthusiastic tour guide. He basically goes off on a never ending puzzle of words that honestly doesn’t make much sense but has a lot of meaning.

Like you pointed out Speed seems to lack in socializing with others. It’s almost as if there’s no one else around. All the man sees is the city of New York and nothing else. Throughout the film I don’t think Speed made any real contact with any individual. The only person he seemed to have somewhat of a close relationship with was the bus driver. However, that’s only because he works on the same bus as Speed and really has no other choice but to talk to him. The tourists didn’t even approach Speed they pretty much just tuned him out. This isn’t unusual though for Speed, he has a history of getting tuned out. No one really believed in him or gave him an opportunity which led to his faltering social abilities. I know this because during probably one of the most memorable scenes (the bridge scene), he goes off on how he worked so hard on his ambitions and everyone turned him down. The only person/thing that didn’t turn Speed away or make fun of him was New York. New York did nothing to hurt Speed, it let him freely walk its streets and do what he pleased. That’s why he loves it so much and has such a close relationship with it. New York gave him his long awaited opportunity.

[nlipton]

I think that this movie not only gives the non-New York residing viewer the wrong idea about Speed, but it also leaves many in the dark about life in New York in general. I noticed in the thread, and subsequent responses that everyone feels as though Speed is a completely isolated loser, lacking any form of human interaction of a valid measure. It is also suggested time and again that his connections with the buildings fill that void, and it is suggestive in these texts that those viewing Cruise find this largely unhealthy. To me this simply shows that non of these viewers have an understanding of New York City, what it is like to live there, or any sense of history regarding the city.
New York is famously large, crowded, and hard working. This breeds isolation for any and all inhabitants without a purpose. It has been said many times that NYC is not a place you live for relaxation, but a place you go to for work. While it is of course an amazingly fun city, any more than two weeks and any visitor will begin to feel beat down by the city and it’s constant hustle. It is an expensive place, with millions of hard working individuals hoping to squeeze even more into their lives, and this has created sub-cultures all over the city typical of a lifestyle like Speed’s.
Seeing that this film was creating in 1998, New York had already gone through it’s massive Giuliani inspired re-creation. The lower East Side nut house community had been disbanded, the northern ghetto’s were no longer a place to fear, and crime had already been drastically reduced in the city limits. Likewise Brooklyn was beginning it’s gentrification into a hipster paradise. To me Speed is no more different than any one of the other members of New York’s eccentric yet harmless artistic population.
To say Speed has no real interpersonal relations is just ill informed. I would beg to differ and even bet money on the fact that he enjoys a healthy nightlife in a city that doesn’t sleep. To say he lacks a sex life is to say that the film followed him all hours of the night, into seedy Brooklyn dive bars and crowded mid-town clubs. I don’t recollect seeing any real footage of speed at night, or in a relaxing environment. So how can this assumption be made?
Finally, the idea that his love of the city is somehow a mask to deal with his lack of interpersonal relations is just misguided. He is a New Yorker, and an intelligent one at that, so of course he has a love of his city. New Yorkers feel a pride like non other regarding their surrounding environment. Ask anyone from the city what their favorite building, neighborhood, street, statue, or even tree is and they will give you a surprisingly long and thought out answer.
Speed isn’t suffering from a lack of human contact, he is just another of New York’s oddities. A sense of freedom, romanticism, and passion consume him, and this causes him to realize that the city he calls home truly is larger than him. I see nothing odd or wrong about Speed, or his lifestyle.

[Jtan]

I wholeheartedly disagree with JWray's assessment of the film. I don't see how you can extrapolate that Speed's relationship with the city and buildings comes from failed relationships with humans. Furthermore, I don't know how you can make the claim that Speed only does the tours because it is between him and the buildings. To try and reduce his relationship to the city to failed human relationships, or his inability to interact with people, undermines the power and weight of this film. Speed provides a very unique approach to the city as an almost living organism. He constantly personifies buildings and structures and speaks to it and of it. This isn't from his lack of interpersonal skills but rather a unique approach to how we interact and embrace our surroundings. Why should the city be a cold thing, disconnected from ourselves, when we interact with it everyday. It seems that when Speed is cruising, he is connecting himself with the city and the people in it. He sees them as interacting and depending on one another. To discount this and instead provided an ad-homonym argument for Speed's lack of sexual life is to miss the point of the movie entirely.

[cwhite]

Timothy Levitch is afraid of people. He has only known bad relationships, at least by what he tells the viewer, causing to have anxiety with people in general. His anxiety is then channeled into his absurdness when alone, or just talking to the camera. He can be completely himself, with no one judging him. He doesn't have to worry about the camera being disappointed by his eccentricities. Levitch feels the same about the city. The buildings and museums don’t talk back to him so he can impress them with his enthusiasm. His bus tour commentary is his worship session, no religion, but instead praying to New York City. Although appears to change his demeanor when talking to people, he doesn’t seem to care about what people think unless he is directly in conversation with them. Levitch can twirl in Times Square as much as he pleases without any personality disguise. At these moments it’s almost like he’s performing for the city because that’s what he cares most about.

[kflagg]

In an interview with a Marc Savlov of the Austin Chronicle, the director of the documentary, Bennett Miller, tells the background story of his friendship with Tim ‘Speed’ Levitch. They were friends before the filming, but eventually Miller “introduced a camera into the equation of their [their] friendship”.
I can see why Miller felt the desire to capture Levitch’s story on film. I see a strong parallel between Harold and Tim. I got the impression that Tim is from an affluent background and by the way he speaks, he is well-educated. Both Harold and Tim struggle with identity on a daily basis. While Harold finds comfort in connecting with Maude, Tim finds his solace in the city. Cities are a reflection upon the people that built them and they are living organisms in the same way that we are. Levitch views a city as an opportunity to understand the people that built it. I was struck by how awkward and indecisive he was at his place of work and just how fed up the people around him were with his “shtick”. He has people skills as evidenced by his friendship with Miller and some of the bus drivers, yet it seems that he prefers to connect with the city instead of people. Is he tired of humanity? He is a man at war with his past, searching for happiness. He finds it in one of mankind’s proudest modern achievement, New York City.

[K Bonnington]

I spent the entire movie trying to judge if his personality and actions were that of someone that is too authentic and too real to fit in with those around him, or if he was just the complete opposite of those things. He spends basically no time trying to relate to actually relate to people, but rather he seeks to alienate them through his strange words and behavior. He isn’t rude or mean; he just has a distinct personality of someone that believes they are far better than their surroundings. It is very difficult to listen to him talk because he purposely attempts to mask his intended statements with overly-complex word choices. He says that he only got into the job he does because he wanted to meet more ladies. Yet at no point does the film show him actually making an attempt to flirt or date anyone on the tours. He also doesn’t actually seem to care about doing a good job so much as just putting on a show while giving the tours. This is quite obvious when he admits to throwing out a random fact and knowing it was wrong. It is true that he seems to have no friends and indeed his conversations directed at people who had hurt him were addressed to the bridge itself. Taking all of this in, it is hard to see him as an entirely authentic person. His actions and words feel big and meaningful, but looking more closely he really isn’t what he likes to think he is. He even indirectly advocates for the destruction of his allegedly beloved buildings when he says “let’s blow up the grid system!” Some of his ideas could be authentic on their own, but coming from him they just seem to help build his façade of a personality. In reality that man is most likely just suffering from a bad childhood and a few really bad experiences as an adult that have led him to retract from real social situations. This is all relevant because he comes off a lot like the girl from Ghost World. He has gone so far in the direction of trying to be different, that being different is what is defining him more than anything else. It leaves him feeling like a person who hates things just to hate them, or in his case criticizing them just for the sake of criticizing them. This isn’t to say that he doesn’t have some wit, he just doesn’t put it to any good use for himself.

[K.Rubey]

In accordance to your view of Speed's interpersonal relationships, I believe you hold a valid point of his affinity for personifying inanimate objects and structures as a replacement for his dwindled communication with society. A society with complete oblivion to his unique language and culture of living with life, not 'a' life.

With the absence of true development within his humanistic relations, he finds solace in the intrinsic values of his environment that will be an everlasting, static entity with him on his cruise. People around him seem to under-stimulate him as he looks at the world inside out. Through his eyes, people constantly appear and fade in life, through the traditional cycle of what society classifies as "living well" rather than focusing an the experience of life itself. It seems people around him are simply drifting in their existence without freeing themselves into the higher understanding of the cruise; rendering them mostly unrelatable. People who cross Speed's path are just a means to temporary desires while the city will always be to him, an end in itself.

The city is in a sense, experiencing his life with him as he tours around it, singing it's song--emphasizing it's umbrella-like web of relationships with other human beings who have been affected by living in its shadow.
Rather than a replacement for his real life friendships, the city is almost a simulation of divinity, yet both he and the city sustain the same level of authority and righteousness; so it becomes more of a rollercoastering affair, but perhaps still a variation of a strange friendship.

He channels his spiritual experience through the city as if the city influences him to reflect upon himself, the city as a functioning organism, reflecting his functions, fluctuations and frustrations as a human being. To Speed this seems like an effect or power a person cannot induce him to feel. To be specific, he has a higher thrill for psychosexual imaginings brought on by how a structure appears to him, rather than the dull version reality defines it as. Without relations to other people, he uses his relations with his surroundings which are consistently with him, to express and learn about himself, because unlike people, these figures are unwavering constants in his life; therefore they seem to know him. This seems to be the key for his replacement of his experience with his non-human environment over his communication with his human environment.