this and that

[floatingleaf]

Had a lovely evening yesterday visiting a friend who has recently returned from a trip to Cuba. There were photos and stories and yummy rummy drinks in abundance.:) Then, while I was lounging around, trying to recover from the drinks before the drive back home, my friend put on a movie. Pan's Labyrinth. It is not available on DVD yet, but she managed to download it from somewhere. I don't think I had even heard about it, let alone knew what to expect - but I was hooked from the first minutes and sat through the whole thing with my mouth hanging open in amazement, not caring that it was past midnight already and that I was most likely earning myself another lack-of-sleep headache.

The movie is astounding. It is a flawlessly crafted work of art. So beautifully shot... so poignantly tragic. It combines fantasy and harsh historical realism in a way I have never seen before. It is disturbingly dark, with no "artificial sweeteners" or incongruously "glued on" happy ending - which is precisely what I found so stunning and refreshing about it. It shows, in a deeply symbolic way, how the cruel world poisons childhood dreams. There is strong violent content, and I will admit right away that I didn't protest when my friend hit fast-forward during the most disturbing scenes; but the heartbreaking sadness of it all is so pure and elevated somehow that the strongest impression the film leaves with the viewer is that of beauty. And the CGI sequences are a masterpiece of dark, ominous art in themselves; in fact, they reminded me strongly of Zdzislaw Beksinski, whose paintings I greatly admire, but would never dare hang over my bed, for fear of what dreams may come...

There was also another friend of mine at the little Cuban party, and she brought a friend of hers, whom I had only met once before - and as we chatted along, it turned out that this friend of a friend used to rent a nice studio for $600 in a quiet, not too crowded neighbourhood bordering on Chicago and its northwestern suburbs (which is precisely where I want to live). She promised to find her former landlord's phone number for me, so that I could check if he happens to have any vacancies right now. There is no guarantee of anything coming out of that, of course, but I decided that hearing about it this very moment was a sign for me to wait and not fill out the application on the apartment I visited on Saturday. It was only the second place I saw, after all. I tried to contact more rentals today, but was mostly unsuccessful, other than learning that one address has no studios available. There are only two places left on my list that I got no response from, and I have already decided that at least one of them is too far from where I work... so I guess that means I am not going anywhere in February. I am trying to convince myself to take it easy and aim for March... but I constantly catch myself fantasizing about the move, about shopping for all kinds of stuff to fill my new apartment, about organizing my private space and just BEING somewhere on my own. I'm afraid it's turning into an obsession. There aren't many things I ever craved so much. I guess it just hit me that I spent half of my life never actually having a place I wasn't forced by circumstances to share with anyone. And I never seemed to mind it much - but that could be just because it never occured to me that such a possibility would ever exist. Now that it has become almost tangible, it just won't leave me alone. I don't care whether I am a legal owner of that place or just a tenant - all I care about is that I can close the door behind me and be totally, completely at ease, whenever I want. Oh the profound joy of that... *deep sigh, filled with longing* ;D

OK. Enough rambling. I went to bed far too late last night, and I need to try and make up for that if I want to be remotely coherent at work tomorrow...

Comments

[miladyhawke.livejournal.com]

You're really getting me psyched for that movie! I'm dying to see it. I might get a chance in Philly in two weeks, if it's out in any of the indie theaters there.