Elementary Sunshine

[mallorys_camera]

It turned out to be a nice birthday.

The boys video-called me, so we all got to banter together for an hour. We plan to do this on a regular basis and are investigating ways we might be able to play long-distance Scrabble. (“The problem is that we’re all going to be pulling out separate tiles from the bag,” RTT noted owlishly.)

I dug up the garden. For a smallish plot that's only approximately 150 square feet, it turned out to be a hellish amount of work.

I worked on the economy of the Caribbean island of Ste. Sybyl:



I did a wee bit of paying work.

Zhen emerged from the lower depths to tell us all about the famine in China. Coronavirus victims continue to die there in massive numbers, she assures us. She’s seen the videos smuggled out of Hubei—and you can see them, too, on that website, though sadly, they’re interspersed with Fox News propaganda clips.

For dinner, I ate challah and the most delicious Stilton cheese with studded with dried mangos.

Then I watched Portrait of a Lady On Fire.

The movie chronicles the story of a love affair between a painter and her subject in 18th century Bretagne. It moves exceedingly s-l-o-w-l-y. One gets the sense that this was indeed what life was like there then; long days, punctuated by silence, that were mostly about keeping the various flames burning: fireplaces, candlewicks, human hearts.

There is one extraordinary moment in the film. As I say, one of the most noticeable things about the movie is its silence. The characters speak, and that’s about it for sound. Then, at the midpoint of the film, the three main characters visit a bonfire on a beach at night. There are other women at the bonfire—and possibly some men, too, but this director’s camera isn’t interested in men.

A very strange sound begins to rise from the screen.

It’s weird. It’s arresting.

Eventually the sound incarnates as a kind of canon that all the women at the bonfire are singing.

Unearthly music!

The moment reminded me a bit of Midsommar although the two films are not stylistically alike, Midsommar being an explosion of color and Portrait of a Lady on Fire being the muted palette of colors seen through thick fog. With both films, though, one gets the sense one is peering at an authentic folk culture, though I have a feeling this chant was invented for this movie just as those strange murals were invented for Midsommar.

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The difference between good days and bad days for me?

Sunshine.

It’s that elementary.