I had a hard time deciding whether or not I should try to write about Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Blissfully Yours. It was such a moving cinematic experience that I felt an obligation to share my appreciation of the film with anyone who would listen, but on the other hand I feel like trying to reduce the experience in to a few paragraphs on with my less than stellar writing ability would be a sin and an insult to its poetic beauty. I decided to go with a happy middle ground and express my appreciation without attempting to articulate anything about the viewing experience.
If the experience of viewing film could be perfectly captured in written form then there would be no need for the medium. Absorb the unassuming ethereal beauty of Blissfully Yours (or all of Joe’s work for that matter) for yourselves and hopefully it will move you as strongly as it moved me. It may not move you at all or it may move you in more profound and different ways than it moved me but that is the wonderful thing about art and the subjectivity of experiencing it.
With film you put yourself in a dark room and submit to the bombardment of audiovisual information and the whims and artistic agenda of the filmmaker. You bring with you the sum total of your life experiences to that point and if you are a film lover you strive for some sort of resonating connection. It doesn’t have to substantial or life altering but when you find that small connection in a film you feel that the film had always been a part of your life, you just hadn’t gotten around to seeing it yet. When the resonance is strong you feel that no one else could possibly feel the same type of emotional connection to the work as you. It was though the film existed only for you because no one else has had the same life experiences nor could they possibly understand pain so deep or joy so elating. Your pragmatic side tells you that these types of feelings are universal to the human condition, but that doesn’t stop you from feeling that this work of art belongs to you alone.
[notification type=”star”]99/100 -It may not move you at all or it may move you in more profound and different ways than it moved me but that is the wonderful thing about art and the subjectivity of experiencing it.[/notification]
