#before sunset
celine
Some of Haydée outfits in the movie “La Collectionneuse” [1967]
I distance, i isolate, i’m vague; me & my darknesses are mates. They protect me, talk me out into loving my brightness. I open up, i trust, i let myself go; me & my brightnesses are mates. My darkness & brightness belong to me, they’re whom I’m comfortable with, contradict a myth.
- allisineffable
Sunrise
“Sunrises are for the survivors, for the ones who’ve weathered storms, the ones left standing after the hell of a night in the er, the ones holding your hand through darkness because they’ve learned to only need the light inside them. Sunrises are for the few who will survive nightmares with you, who will help you fight monsters and slay dragons. Sunrises are for reality, for the grittiness of it, for the bags under your eyes, messy hair and spotty skin. Sunrises are where life begins.”
Sunset
“Sunsets are for the romantics, for the idealists and the believers. For those fond of the calm, those who’ve been sheltered, who’ve never had to weather a storm. Sunsets are for first dates, for exchanging names and hobbies and talking about dreams. Sunsets are for promises.”
The movie is set in 2004, the same year it was released in theaters, but it feels like a portrait of another era, and it is hard to imagine it felt any different to viewers when it was first released. The film looks like old photos from the ‘70s and ‘80s and ‘90s, softened with the slightly blurry sheen of age. All the colors are the colors of a photo filter meant to evoke nostalgia, the greens too bright to be real and everything else muted and watered down; even the ugly things are beautiful because all this is occurring in memory and not in present experience. The main emotion in this movie is the same one that drives people to use those apps that make Instagram posts look like old polaroids. It’s the thing my stomach does when I look at old photos of my parents and wonder why the colors aren’t quite right, why the quality of light was different in the ‘80s and ‘90s, photos fading into a truer unreality.
-Helena FitzgeraldaboutBefore Sunset
