[DECEMBER 2024.]
It got better. How come?
Standing with one foot on the pier and one foot on a boat departing, the arc of my stride widened, and I grew new bones.
...viewers, as Akerman said in an interview with Cahiers du Cinéma, “divide themselves into two camps: some say it is a very sad film, others find that it gives energy, that it makes you want to go out, that it produces a kind of cocaine effect. When I see it, I feel that too: it makes me want to live strongly [vivre fort].”
It wasn’t cocaine but I felt it pulling me toward the side of life. I also think that just about any movie in the right mood is that kind of Rorschach, which is why I spent decades finding them all sad in the same monotonous way. The world was always at the same distance, held off behind the same pane, transparent and impassable; so what could the silver screen deliver but a mockery of that condition? Now, well, it’s different. I guess slow cinema is like what they say about Antoni Tàpies and the conjuring trick; you know the conjuror didn't actually make the card disappear, you know all the artist did was glue some rope onto the canvas. You have to want to be led along. And these days I do want to be led along. That article quoting Lacan on desire and lack actually seems meaningful—the final stage of degeneration, I’m sure.
