Satisfying
By RUDY!
…the reader can be satisfied by merely hinting at something.
- Jorge Luis Borges
…the reader can be satisfied by merely hinting at something.
The most daunting variety of thoughts I have are in those instances where I realize I am inexplicably losing consciousness and that this event may or may not be the precusor to death. In a heartbeat I think about all the things I should do but then a moment later I am gone in a deep sleep. I awake and realize that either I was really tired or I am terminally ill. Of course, nothing comes of these events, and I go on to the next day as if it were one of an infinite number.
Next variety, are the times I watch the world from the height of another galaxy. People shuffling to and from class. The importance of their lives and the weight the of the events they experience somehow add to a mass greater than that of the known universe surrounding them. Like a highly pressurized object at the depth of the ocean, their buoyancy wins and they rise to the surface. This inevitably leads to thoughts of the paradox: futility of life and the miraculous nature of life. But moreso, it leads towards the personal belief that consciousness is a fluke, a fluke I hold so sacred.
This, invariably, leads me to my next variety of thoughts… the unfathomable and silly obsession I have with the number forty-two. For you see, if you take the total mass of our species on this planet, and calcuate the ratio of our mass to that of the known universe, you find–quite simply, I might add–that we are 10-42 times the mass of the known universe. That is an order of magnitude of minus forty-two. See? Insignificant, and yet, we wage war.
I’ve just come from seeing 400 Blows at the Dryden Theatre. I’ve written here about the first time I watched this film. I was blown away then, and I am blow away now. However, this time it was different.
Previously, I wrote about childhood and about the friendship between the two boys in the film. This time it was the feeling the film bestowed on me that blew me away; a lightheartedness that makes every action somehow magical. Since every action has become magical, every action is now noticed tenfold for the first time. It is this celebratory nature that the multitude of artists and directors inspired by François Truffaut have successfully emulated in thier own works.
Constrast the lighthearted and celebratory feeling of everyday actions to the mechanical routine displayed by Robert Bresson’s models and you have two extremes of the auteur, a director that is the driving force behind a film and hence imprints his style on every facet of its production. I like Bresson’s films, I like the films of Truffaut and those inspired by him. But only a Truffaut film leaves me in a state of bliss where every step from the cinema to my car is magic. And yet, its has only become clear after watching lots of Bresson films, maybe even heightened.
The short film, Antoine et Colette, that followed is a sequel to 400 Blows, where we see the two boys in the film at age twenty. The older Antonie is reminiscent of the young Max Fischer of Rushmore both in appearance and awkward, fool-hearted, and misguided quests. The Dryden Theatre staff played music from the soundtrack of one of Wes Anderson’s films before and after the film. Aptly, since Anderson routinely cites Truffaut as an influence.
Last night, I was lying in bed, lights off, radio off by 2 A. M.–which is an amazing feat for me. However, I was tossing and turning while trying to fall asleep. I don’t really know when I fell asleep, because I had the worst possible dream a restless fool like me could have. I dreamt that I was trying to go to sleep, and I watched the clock as the hours passed, cursing each moment with unending anguish. In my dream I was up way past 5 A.M., in reality, I have no idea when I fell asleep. If I was pressed, I’d have to confess that I really cannot tell if I was dreaming the sleeplessness, or if my dream was reality and my tired mind was playing tricks on me. Hence, ugh.