Incendies (Denis Villeneuve, 2010)
When someone dies it changes everything. No one really knows anyone, not that well. And when there is a death, there are boxes to be found, secrets to be discovered. Death is just the beginning of a new story for those who are left behind.
Stories come from people, because we live stories. We have a beginning, a middle and an end. And when we recount events to people, events from our lives, we put these into the context of a narrative story, similar to a fiction. Events have narrative causality, they have meaning, and these meanings help us to make sense of our own lives. Everything fits together. Everything was meant to be. That is what it is to live a life.
In addition to this there is what it is to always be foreign, of what it is to suffer.
Some people are born foreign. Their parents emigrated and came to a new country, and although their children can integrate perfectly well, they experience a feeling of foreignness in their home country. They are different. Travelling back to the birth country of their parents will probably only result in furthering the foreignness, as the child discovers that they are foreign there too, having more in common with their birth country than their 'homeland'. No matter where these people go, they feel permanently foreign.
Suffering is something that we fear the idea of, but when it inevitably happens to us, we often find ourselves able to undergo it, able to endure it. Possibly because we have faith in something, in a cause, or in someone else. This faith allows us to survive the physical act of suffering. We can do things we never would have thought possible. Or, as another possibility, we can crumble. But often we don't. People can be surprisingly strong in the face of adversity when they believe in something.
All of this is wrapped up in looking at things, in staring at people in places, and being looked back at. This form of looking may seem pointless at the time, but everything has meaning, and it is through the looking and the revelations made to us that we understand the importance of everything, how everything is connected.
Stories come from people, because we live stories. We have a beginning, a middle and an end. And when we recount events to people, events from our lives, we put these into the context of a narrative story, similar to a fiction. Events have narrative causality, they have meaning, and these meanings help us to make sense of our own lives. Everything fits together. Everything was meant to be. That is what it is to live a life.
In addition to this there is what it is to always be foreign, of what it is to suffer.
Some people are born foreign. Their parents emigrated and came to a new country, and although their children can integrate perfectly well, they experience a feeling of foreignness in their home country. They are different. Travelling back to the birth country of their parents will probably only result in furthering the foreignness, as the child discovers that they are foreign there too, having more in common with their birth country than their 'homeland'. No matter where these people go, they feel permanently foreign.
Suffering is something that we fear the idea of, but when it inevitably happens to us, we often find ourselves able to undergo it, able to endure it. Possibly because we have faith in something, in a cause, or in someone else. This faith allows us to survive the physical act of suffering. We can do things we never would have thought possible. Or, as another possibility, we can crumble. But often we don't. People can be surprisingly strong in the face of adversity when they believe in something.
All of this is wrapped up in looking at things, in staring at people in places, and being looked back at. This form of looking may seem pointless at the time, but everything has meaning, and it is through the looking and the revelations made to us that we understand the importance of everything, how everything is connected.