Then my MUNCH got ENGAGED!!! yo yo yo. Talk about 1-2 oh my god!
(Listen to me now, and listen to me later.)
I know my job is to report and accurately portray my experience. It's a constant challenge to do so.
Melancholia. The movie. It's like old times, in that the majority hates what I love. I get it, but I've also been there. Where I feel that "Dancer in the Dark" was full of ridic, lame-ass emotional appeal; I feel that, aside from Enter the Void, there has never been a film (or a piece of art, for that matter) that felt so inherently true as Lars von Trier's Melancholia.
Say what you will about any artist. I just don't care. I feel that entities are entities and that none are absolutely good or evil. I also know that we all possess both, and to say that we don't is a lie. In fact, I think that a good artist is one who can embrace both the good and the evil within them. This doesn't mean that I wish that everyone would embrace both. I just don't feel that either can be negated. Nor do I feel that one is more poignant than the other. There was a time, say, 1982-1992, where I refused to acknowledge any darkness whatsoever. Then there was a time, say, 1993-2008, where I knew that there was a darkness, and I dabbled within it, but still believed that "love" or "goodness" or "magic" could "overcome" it. Thanks to an ongoing pattern of frightening actuality, I've been forced to sit, for hours, face-to-face, with that dark side. I battled it. I denied it. I delved within it. Regardless of its role in my life, I still found it haunting. Then I saw Melancholia.
It's not that this film will change everything for everyone. In fact, most of the people with whom I identify (aside from SIS, of course) actually hate this movie. Yet, for me, it was a release, a catharsis, and an inspiration. I read reviews that called it "uplifting" and thought, "Come on. We all know that's impossible. It's Lars von Trier". Then I saw the film at Cinefamily at the Silent Movie Theater on Fairfax. They mentioned before the film that this was Lars von Trier's personal experience with depression and that he'd run it by psychiatrists post-writing, and the doctors said that it was an accurate depiction of depression. That little blurb alone likely affected my entire experience of the film. I've dealt with depression. I've had everyone hate me because of the way I acted during that time. I get it.
To me, this film is not only deep and relevant, but prophetic and divinely inspired. I know, I know. Von Trier made terribly appalling comments about sympathizing with Hitler and how Albert Speer was one of God's finest children, or something to that effect. Those comments were definitely ridic. That's for sure. Still, people's sociopathic behavior doesn't necessarily prevent them from creating compelling art. Melancholia made it feel natural to embrace that ever-present darkness with fearlessness. The gorgeous presentation of such darkness didn't hurt. This film has enhanced my ability to work, to make art, and to conceptualize in a way I never have before. It brought me somewhere that I didn't realize that I was willing to go, and it awakened something within me that's powerful, omniscient, and indescribably dynamic.
