This week, I’ll be highlighting three films about lovers in existential crises, or as I like to say struggling to “let go your earthly tether”. Just bear with me, ok? This one’s a little more inspired than usual. Our three films are Abbas Kiarostami’s Certified Copy, Alfonso Cuaron’s Y Tu Mama Tambien, and Terrence Malick’s To the Wonder.
Certified Copy is a film that would be pointless to try and give a logline for, as it’s impossible, truly, to differentiate realities in the film. In a rather vain attempt to give you an idea of what we’re dealing with, one might say that the film is about a man and a woman spending an afternoon together in Tuscany, and what follows is a mind-bending meditation on what may or may not be a relationship between them. Are they becoming lovers? Do they already have a long history together? Or is it all some sort of surreal game? Where does the role-play begin and the reality end?
More important than the mysterious ways Kiarostami plays with reality is the thematic landscape to mine. If indeed we do buy into the notion of it all being some sort of role-play between a man and a woman, it could be two strangers attempting to hash out the arguments they never got a chance to have with their true lovers, or a role-play about being strangers that two lovers then find themselves unable to keep up. So what is it about the film that makes it so sublime? The way the conversations lead to the things we always wish we could say to those we love, but never do? The way it perfectly captures that inability to move past those petty grievances? It’s hard to nail it down, but maybe that’s the point: it’s all so elusive to find that perfect balance within our relationships, that trying to do so only results in frustration and misery.
Going back in time a bit, we come to Y Tu Mama Tambien, one of Alfonso Cauron’s finest films. Following a pair of teenagers in the summer between high school and college, they encounter an older woman, and inadvertently invite her along on a road trip to the beach in a momentary attempt to flirt with and impress her. In a series of events, she decides to rebel against a quiz result implying she was a woman afraid to claim her freedom, and makes the impromptu decision to accompany them… to a beach that doesn’t exist.
What follows is an often hilarious and frequently devastating look at the bond between two boys imitating men, and the woman who changes their lives forever. This might actually be Cuaron’s funniest film, especially when poking fun at the two boys’ juvenile perceptions of sex and love. Luisa flirtatiously asks them about their sexual histories, leading to a particularly hilarious piece of punch-line editing midway through the film. But it’s also a deeply moving piece of work, framing Luisa’s own quest to let go of the shackles of her life within a story of two boys trying to become men, only to have their love for one another completely shattered by one fateful journey.
Finally, we come to To the Wonder, the most recent film by Terrence Malick. This film caught much more critical flack than the majority of Malick’s work, with many calling it empty, or self-parody. I, however, found it to be a stunning piece of work. Not as cosmically ambitious as something like The Tree of Life, but perhaps Malick’s most personally ambitious; seemingly based loosely upon Malick’s own past with a pair of women that he broke the hearts of. In a lot of ways, the film is a kind of confession from Malick, as he seeks forgiveness from these women, and ultimately, from God. I wrote a much longer piece about the film last year, calling it Malick’s “communion with the self”, and how the film is a big, open wound that I found incredibly moving. Do yourself a favor and give this one a chance.
