Remembering Bodhi

Just yesterday, Patrick Swayze lost his battle with pancreatic cancer. I really thought he was going to make it, or I really just hoped he would make it.

It’s been interesting hearing people’s reactions to Patrick Swayze’s death. For women, they are heartbroken over the loss of Johnny Castle (Dirty Dancing) and Sam Wheat (Ghost). Men though, are broken up over the loss of Dalton (Road House) and Bodhi (Point Break). Although Patrick Swayze's career spanned over 40 films, it’s these four that have endured in the hearts of cinemagoers. For me, he will always be Bodhi.

Released in 1991, Point Break was a mild success at the box office. Over the years, however, it has become a cult classic. The immensely popular Point Break Live!, credited as the first ever "reality play," has toured to sold-out audiences across the country since its Seattle debut in 2003. 

In reading about Swayze’s life today, the one thing people who knew him have said is how humble and kind he was to others. According to IMDB, he has been with his wife since 1975. That has to be a record in Hollywood. Swayze’s humble and kind nature really rubs off on the character of Bodhi, and Swayze created a cinematic rarity; the sympathetic antagonist.

It’s easy to see how Keanu Reeves’s character in Point Break, FBI agent Johnny Utah, could be seduced into Bodhi’s world so easily. Bodhi’s spiritual outlook on life is a perfect match for Johnny’s conventional upbringing. Their bond and friendship grows so strong that Johnny is blinded by the fact that his new friend is really the criminal that he is chasing.

Unfortunately, after Point Break, Swayze’s career really fell off the map. It’s too bad because he was a really talented actor who was due for a comeback. His work earlier this year on the A&E drama, The Beast, was some of the best acting of his career.

According to his friends and colleagues, Patrick Swayze was many things. He was an accomplished dancer, talented actor, a skydiver, a pilot, and a loving husband. He leaves behind a cinematic legacy that most actors would envy. When diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, Swayze continued working and living a full life until the very end. He refused to ever become a victim to this horrible disease. Although Patrick Swayze’s life was cut short at the age of 57, while he was here, he had the “time of his life.”