Before Sunsire: A unique take on love via conversation

So, the entire movie is a couple exploring a new place while exploring the inner lives and thoughts of the other person. The night is magical moving from a cemetery, to by the water, a picnic with wine, a fountain, a music shop, and a Ferris Wheel. I don’t the movie made huge distinction between love at first sight and love through conversation, because when they are on the “phone” with their “friends” they basically say that they fell for the person almost instantly, and by talking to them, they began to like them more and more.

In response to other blog post on how this movie was different from Romantic Comedies nowadays I say I don’t agree, but instead I think that it is a quite typical Romantic Comedy. Everything is wrapped up neatly at the end, they say goodbye and plan of meeting in six months. There is a passionate embrace. This movie is a much more typical Romantic comedy then was Annie Hall, which didn’t have a happy end, but it more raw and real. I guess these two people are living is a kind of surreal fantasy, which they mention multiple times throughout the movies.

 A big part of the movie is the beautiful, romantic setting, full wonder and mystery. A lot of lines in the movie seem very over written and fake. Like “I saw Grandma in the rainbow,” or “In Quaker weddings, no one speaks unless the Lord moves them. After an hour they are married.”  I think the movie portrays this fakeness at the end, when it flashes to all the spectacular places they visited throughout the night, now seem ordinary in light of day. There was something about the setting at night, and that is was only for night that made it seem special, but part that was their own perceptions and ideals they hold about romance and love.

Annie Hall

I love this film's non traditional approach to the Romantic Comedy genre. The film was absolutely hilarious, but not in the expected, tired, and tawdry ways we have come to except from the genre. Woody Allen is witty and very perceptive in all his relationships. He has an uncanny ability to sense the exact point in the relationship where it is beyond any help, like in his previous marriages and then with Annie. The film does not just focus on the narrow scope of the relationship, but shows other factors like jobs, location, drug use, family ideals that all effect a relationship.

The cutaways provide a running narrative into the insights and concerns of the main characters, allowing us to actually know what they are thinking, not just forced to guess from dialogue and body language. It shows that there is a lot of underlying tensions under the surface of a relationship, giving this movie greater relevance and truth than most other romantic comedies.

That's what really bothers me about feel good movies like The Notebook or The Vow, they are not at all realistic. Annie Hall demonstrates that just because the audience may be rooting for the couple to make it work in the end, you can still produce a great movie, despite it having a sad, but realistic ending. Our culture is currently obsessed with the idea of a fairy tale ending every time and believes that it isn't good unless that is how it ends. I suggest to others out there to watch The Producer or Sunset BLVD, because these movies poke fun at this phenomena.

Last Post, Misinterpreting Art

It may just look like a movie about experimentation with bisexuality and the "blending" of experiences, but that is just the surface. On a deeper level Kissing Jessica Stein is a movie about the interpretation and misinterpretation of art. Jessica is a hopeful artist and writer, but is too ashamed to show the world her pieces. She is extremely introverted and almost snobby, and definitely neurotic. That being said, she is passionate about art and even if she does not share it with the rest of the world, she is looking for someone to understand and appreciate her art. Helen is not an artist. She is an assistant at a gallery. She is also completely unoriginal. The mysterious quote she uses for her want ad isn't even her idea, but something her friend picks off of his shelf and reads to her. Helen misinterprets art all the time. She believes Jessica's slowness to engage in physical relations is because she's a "tease." She knows from the beginning that Jessica is straight and yet she makes moves and sees signals where there are none or little.
Basically Helen finds a girl who's down on her luck and exploits her weakness, thinking she can turn her into a lesbian. Helen's two gay friends warn her about her behavior while they are searching in a dump for pieces of art. They tell her she knows her friend is completely straight right. She then tries to have a deep thought provoking question: If we both had sex with you, would you tell the difference? Her "insightful" comment is dismissed when her guy friend says: I don't know, Helen, do you get tired and stop half-way through? Then, Helen's lack of artistic insight is shown once again when picking up random pieces of trash Helen endeavors to find art, and is unsuccessful until her friend finds a piece for her. Towards the end when Jessica and Helen are decorating their apartment, Helen is again unoriginal, using a Feng Shui book to figure out where to put furniture. Helen and Jessica both are living a deluded fantasy believing that two girl friends could become long term sexual partners.
The movie points to the person who is also an artist and who understands Jessica's art the whole movie. It is the neglected ex boyfriend that ends up snagging Jessica's true sexual affection in the end. They both begin to discuss what they are writing about and the hardships of being a starving artist, when they ask for each other's phone numbers and emails. Maybe I'm completely off-base about the true intent of the movie, but there has got to be more to this movie than sexual experimentation.

This class has really made me think about love different. Of course I still love my husband and believe he's the one, but I see now pop culture's definition of love to be a perfect fairy tale as untrue. I guess I knew that before the class, but never quite specifically, just an idea. It's true that relationships aren't perfect and there is a part of us that will never be fulfilled by a relationship.

Temporal Issues in Simple Passion

Annie Ernaux is slightly more obsessive than Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction; her unrestrained desire resembles a bipolar patient in the throws of an episode, more than someone in love. She associates apparently unrelated things with the moments of sexual passion she experienced with A. In Florence, Michelangelo’s David reminded her of A, “I was unable to tear myself away from Michelangelo’s David, filled with wonder that a man, and not a woman, had portrayed the beauty of a male body so sublimely” (37).  In order to recall certain events, she goes back to the places of origin, or reads certain books, or wears certain makeup. Annie said, “If I went to the same place I had been to last year, when he was here, I would wear the same suit as before, trying to convince myself that identical circumstances produce identical effects and that he would call me that evening” (43).  

She also frequently breaks in and out of past and present tense, “The past tense used in the first part of the book suggests endless repetition and conveys the belief that ‘life was better in those days.’ It also generated a pain that was to replace the past trauma of waiting for his phone calls and visits” (47).  Annie portrays the contrived concepts of present and past, by switching between the two tenses for stylistic purposes rather than adding to the truth of when the events actually took place.

This gives rise to the fact that once something is written, even in present tense, it has already happened and therefore, now is in the past. The notion that every recorded event, as soon as it is written is in the past, demonstrates her unwillingness to see their relationship as in the past, by writing it that way. Instead, she purposely chooses to write in the present midway in order to express that their affair will always be existing in the present for her, because she is constantly reliving the past through the clothes she wears and books she reads. Annie is unwilling to let go of their cold, almost passionless affair, and endeavors to immortalize what happened between them and the inexplicable desire she felt through writing.

All in all, as a whole, this short story attempts to recreate the feeling of desire and its expression in an affair that ended up badly. Ironically, Annie herself predicts the affair’s tragic ending early on, “If he told me that he had indeed seen the film, I was inclined to believe that he had chosen it that evening because of us and that, acted out on the screen, our story must have seemed more intense, or at least more legitimate. (Naturally, I soon dismissed the idea that our liaison might appear dangerous to him—in film, any passion existing outside marriage invariably end in disaster.)” (27). Even though there are many clues given to the readers that this liaison will end badly, and, at times, her pitiful desire is hard to read, Annie accurately captures the feelings most have when they are tormented with desire or unrequited love, which often times are more similar to a mental patient than a person in simple passion.

Franz Ferdinand Auf Achse

You see her, you can't touch her

You hear her, you can't hold her

You want her, you can't have her

You want to, but she won't let you

You see her, you can't touch her

You hear her, you can't hold her

You want her, you can't have her

You want to, but she won't let you

She's not so special so look what you've done, boy [Repeat: x3]

She's not so special so look what you've done

Now you wish she'd never come back here again

Oh, never come back here again

You want her, you can't have her

You want to, but she won't let you

You see her, you can't touch her

You hear her, you can't hold her

You want her, you can't have her

You want to, but she won't let you

She's not so special so look what you've done, boy [Repeat: x3]

She's not so special so look what you've done

Now I'm nailed above you

Gushing from my side

It's with your sins that you have killed me

Thinking of your sins I die

Thinking how you'd let them touch you

How you'd never realize

That I'm ripped and hang forsaken

Knowing never will I rise

Again

You still see her

Oh, you hear her

You want her

Oh, you want to

You see her

You hear her

You want her

You still want to

Ok, this song is rather obscure, but I really like the emotion in the song. I definitely believe it relates to the class discussions we’ve been having, because it implies an unrequited love, which I think is one of the most interesting kinds.

“You see her, you can't touch her

You hear her, you can't hold her

You want her, you can't have her

You want to, but she won't let you.”

It is more realistic and heartfelt that this guy wants a girl, but there is something that’s preventing him from getting to her.

I also think that this song refers to two kinds of love: between a man and a women and between Christ and his church. These are two of the strongest types of love so that’s why I chose it. I can just picture Ricardo or the guy from “The Obscure Object of Desire” singing this song gloomily to themselves.

I believe religious love is not something we’ve explored in this class yet. We’ve focused more on Romantic love. That being said, agape love is the word used to describe this powerful love between the creator and created. According to many religions, mostly Christianity, this love is great and indescribable, and is supposed to be why romantic love can never be complete or satisfied. Obviously in this song it displays the harsh realities of this kind of love since he was, “ripped and hang forsaken.”

This song reminds of the “gentle wounds,” and how much love can hurt more than it helps. It makes me think that in any type of love man or women, religious, or familial that It will never be perfect. Just because it has been “romanticized” by television and movies, this class explores the truth behind all the lies. 

Lost in Translation

Ricardo finally gets “over” the bad girl, sort of, but dating some one new, safe and normal. When I was first reading this, I thought that Marcella was a new identity the bad girl was going by, so when I found out that Ricardo was finally with a different girl, I was shocked. In a book of any sort or in real life, it is weird that the person or character is only with one person their entire life. However, their relationship is much less tense and sexual and Ricardo’s relationship with the bad girl.

Novels and translation is important as well, and is something I didn’t think about until after our class discussion last week. At first Ricardo only does translation, but because of his accident, he is no longer able to do that anymore. In the end, we as readers assume that he followed the bad girl’s commission to write down their entire relationship is novel form. Even then, the story is still a form of translation—not really his own. He is only writing how he perceived the  relationship through his eyes.

The bad girl reminded me of Madame Bovary in that she does try for a portion of her life to settle down with Ricardo and be the model wife. She is not satisfied, and though she tells him in the end that she no longer finds happiness in money but in being his wife, I almost want to believe her this time. However, once again, she leaves him for a richer man—for the last time and he gives up, not wanting to get hurt again. 

Is the Bad Girl so bad...YES! But Ricardito's not perfect either

I personally loved this book, more than any other love story. To me, it is more real than any other love story. It follows a whole life of love, and does not just end when they marry or have sex. It follows the relationship through all the rejections, rapes, and hotel rooms. This story does not buy into the myth of a perfect relationship. If anything it says there is no such thing as a perfect relationship. Each character is deep and layered. Neither are stereotypes. At times, I could just murder the bad girl for what she does; however, I’m mystified by his obsession with the bad girl and wonder why he never moves on to a “normal” girl. Like when he keeps her toothbrush she accidently leaves at his apartment, an he finds more hidden meaning in this most likely accidental gesture. He “caresses the little Guerlain toothbrush she left in his apartment…which he always kept with him, like an amulet” (85).
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 Bad Girl never goes by her own name; all names are her husband’s, which signify ownership. The men give her an identity in her life, her various husbands, and even Ricardito gives the fitting name “the bad girl.” She forms her personality based on the man she is with currently. Ricardito says, “What did she call herself now? What personality, what name, what history had she adopted for this new stage in her life?” (64). Ricardito tells her he loves her all the time, and she always has a witty and deep response. She asks him, “In love with me with knowing me? Do you mean that for ten years you’ve been hoping that one day a girl like me would turn up in your life?” (28).
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 Ricardito is a very passive, but passionate about the bad girl. He is not a go-getter, he is simple only wanting to live in Paris and be with the bad girl. It will take him a while to ever realize that is not enough. It will take many years and hurts until his puppy love lessens for the bad girl. Even then, he is always willing to forgive any of her wrongdoings, after she pleads with him enough. Bad Girl always comes back; she does not find satisfaction in her rich husbands/ lovers. Something about the idea of someone who will always love her and be there for her is appealing, if not just because she is flattered. Ricardito has a strange attraction to the bad girl no matter what horrible thing she does. No matter how many men she marries, he is so content to just be with her, it makes him overjoyed. Without her, his life is empty and meaningless. She does not love him, for she repeats this multiple times through out the novel. Ricardito reflects during sex, “She spoke with so much coldness that she didn’t seem like a girl making love but a doctor formulating a technical description, detached from pleasure. I didn’t care I was totally happy, as I hadn’t been in a long time, perhaps not ever” (51). A lot of doctor language is used in the novel, the bad girl needs a doctor because she does not love in a world where everyone is searching for and falling in love. She is distant and detached from love. She coldness is juxtaposed with Ricardito’s puppy love.
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 I’m sorry if this post is too long, but I have a lot to say about the Bad Girl…