Not just because you just took an abstract, almost ethereal feeling that laid both dormant inside me and bubbling up just enough for me to see it and express it.
Not just because you have completely reframed my favorite film of the year and just given me a reason to rewatch it for the third time.
I feel this way because you have encapsulated, in a way I thought was impossible, a role I have occupied more than my insecurities allow me to admit, and that perhaps I still do in some respects.
Someone once told me the music I listen to sounds like elevator music. I find a somewhat painful yet weirdly poetic embrace in that insight, the fact that I like to feel the company of artistic expression meant for the background.
There’s a Spanish song by Christian singer Marcos Vidal, called Nieve y Agua, that precisely mentions this feeling in a specific verse:
There will always be haughty snow
resting on the road,
and humble water battling
in the wheel of the mill,
there will always be guitars
that accompany
so that others may shine.
--
I think life has quietly and consistently pushed me to understand that sonder is real, that there’s a infinite number of stories we will only get to witness from the sidelines, and that there’s a very peculiar, very unique kind of dignity in accepting that reality.
But of course, with dignity, comes pain. Sadness. The unheard melancholy of the backing instruments. The unbearable weight of cognition, of understanding you’re meant to fill in a gap nobody even knows is there. The certainty of the ultimate form of invisibility. The very same feeling you so eloquently express in this essay.
I almost want to print this article and have it placed on my nightstand so I can reflect on it every single night before I go to bed.
Saying “thank you” seems far too reductive to express my gratitude with you, and with life itself for giving me the privilege of knowing you exist and reading the unique conclusions you arrive to in this virtual space.
Great read! Sentimental Value quietly devastated me, as did Aftersun. By far my favourite film of the year and one I'll timidly come back to for years to come.
I think this ties so beautifully into/entirely reframes the lopsided power dynamics of different artists and their crafts as understood by the film. A filmmaker (i.e. Gustav) has power in a way that an actor (i.e. Nora) does not, both in terms of film-set hierarchy and the filmmaker being able to create physical proof of their externalizations (i.e. the film) whereas the fruits of the actor's craft is bound to intangible, impermanent emotion with nothing objective to ground them. In the case of Gustav and Nora, these dynamics are of course reflected in their familial estrangement.
But with Rachel -- an actress, and therefore theoretically bound by the same unmoored vulnerability that Nora is in her craft -- there's so much interference and deference by Gustav (as you touch on in your post), that her acting takes on a shape of physical consequence to the point where it's taxomoniously not even really acting anymore, just as this film that Gustav wants to make isn't even really a film, but a peace treaty. Rachel's self-benching, then, creates a completely new grammar for both vulnerability and expendability; the latter becomes her personal superpower precisely because the artistic non-negotiable of the former was no longer on the table. So much more to unpack within that, too.
So unreal and not the least bit surprising that MUBI's joined forces with you, Sophie; bravo, bravo, bravo!
I am flabbergasted.
Not just because you just took an abstract, almost ethereal feeling that laid both dormant inside me and bubbling up just enough for me to see it and express it.
Not just because you have completely reframed my favorite film of the year and just given me a reason to rewatch it for the third time.
I feel this way because you have encapsulated, in a way I thought was impossible, a role I have occupied more than my insecurities allow me to admit, and that perhaps I still do in some respects.
Someone once told me the music I listen to sounds like elevator music. I find a somewhat painful yet weirdly poetic embrace in that insight, the fact that I like to feel the company of artistic expression meant for the background.
There’s a Spanish song by Christian singer Marcos Vidal, called Nieve y Agua, that precisely mentions this feeling in a specific verse:
There will always be haughty snow
resting on the road,
and humble water battling
in the wheel of the mill,
there will always be guitars
that accompany
so that others may shine.
--
I think life has quietly and consistently pushed me to understand that sonder is real, that there’s a infinite number of stories we will only get to witness from the sidelines, and that there’s a very peculiar, very unique kind of dignity in accepting that reality.
But of course, with dignity, comes pain. Sadness. The unheard melancholy of the backing instruments. The unbearable weight of cognition, of understanding you’re meant to fill in a gap nobody even knows is there. The certainty of the ultimate form of invisibility. The very same feeling you so eloquently express in this essay.
I almost want to print this article and have it placed on my nightstand so I can reflect on it every single night before I go to bed.
Saying “thank you” seems far too reductive to express my gratitude with you, and with life itself for giving me the privilege of knowing you exist and reading the unique conclusions you arrive to in this virtual space.
Sentimental Value does an amazing job of packing those seemingly simple and straightforward scenes with so much subtext and meaning.
Totally!!
Great read! Sentimental Value quietly devastated me, as did Aftersun. By far my favourite film of the year and one I'll timidly come back to for years to come.
I think this ties so beautifully into/entirely reframes the lopsided power dynamics of different artists and their crafts as understood by the film. A filmmaker (i.e. Gustav) has power in a way that an actor (i.e. Nora) does not, both in terms of film-set hierarchy and the filmmaker being able to create physical proof of their externalizations (i.e. the film) whereas the fruits of the actor's craft is bound to intangible, impermanent emotion with nothing objective to ground them. In the case of Gustav and Nora, these dynamics are of course reflected in their familial estrangement.
But with Rachel -- an actress, and therefore theoretically bound by the same unmoored vulnerability that Nora is in her craft -- there's so much interference and deference by Gustav (as you touch on in your post), that her acting takes on a shape of physical consequence to the point where it's taxomoniously not even really acting anymore, just as this film that Gustav wants to make isn't even really a film, but a peace treaty. Rachel's self-benching, then, creates a completely new grammar for both vulnerability and expendability; the latter becomes her personal superpower precisely because the artistic non-negotiable of the former was no longer on the table. So much more to unpack within that, too.
So unreal and not the least bit surprising that MUBI's joined forces with you, Sophie; bravo, bravo, bravo!
So beautifully said! Thank you love ❤️
Fyi, no Sentimental Value on MUBI in the States! Hopefully soon. And still gonna enjoy that 30 day trial, danke for that 🤗
Ohhh that's interesting 🤔 Yes hopefully soon!! And please enjoy x
I need to watch this. Thanks for the read.
My pleasure 💕
Now I need to go rewatch ALL these films. Talk about finding the perfect excuse to do so. I'm not complaining.
Ugh I'm jealous!!