Only Lovers Left Alive
Recently I have been marking everything I do into my calendar, which shows that I saw “Only Lovers Left Alive” on January 25… and still haven’t written a single word about the film. Loris said that he needs time to think about the film, but I think I gave myself a little bit too much time.
Seeing this from a more positive perspective, I think the most memorable scene to me was the one where Eve packs her bags. Being an old vampire, she needs absolutely nothing, seems to have endless amounts of money and is thus able to afford a life in which love, self-fulfillment and all that stuff we lie to ourselves about are the only things that matter. So Eve packs nothing but books, from all times and written in all kinds of languages (English, French, German, Italian, Spanish?, Arabic, Russian? and Japanese are those I think I remember), fondly going throw some of these books and looking at them with sparkles in her eyes. I don’t think I need to explain how beautiful that was to me, it’s essentally mind porn. I would love to know a few more languages to understand the subtleties of certain works in their original (Russian, ladies and gentlemen!), after all, perhaps this is even why I have a tendency to favor the libretto of operas where I understand the languages (La Damnation de Faust, Salome).
Another thing I loved about this scene (and generally, this movie) is Jim Jarmusch’s display of love for other cultures. He’s just not a weeaboo (though his japanophilia is apparent), but delves rather deeply into many cultures with what looks to me like tender observation. Jarmusch captures things about cultures that other people cannot, and does so with a unique authenticity. After encountering so many cases of cultural narrow-mindedness, I think Jarmusch is the real thing. I have never perceived his films under this aspect before, but this is just another reason confirming Mr. Jarmusch as my favorite director of all times.
Besides living the dream, i.e. a life in material goods don’t matter, the other appealing aspect of “Only Lovers Left Alive” was the main characters’ love for one other. Without any material needs, they can also afford the luxury of having a love relationship in which their love depends on nothing but their feelings for each other, and these are genuinely harmonious and caring. (It’s a “l’amour pour l’amour” relationship.) The film does not provide a single second of doubt of their love, and this is almost as enviable as having all the time in the world to learn 20 languages. At the same time, I think any relationship which has stood the test of so, so, so much time will naturally become comfortable with each other. The portrayal of these two is not that idealistic but feels absolutely realistic to me, and as far as I remember it’s also the only time where Jarmusch shows a relationship which is not dysfunctional. Perhaps he is growing old himself.
I have mostly gotten over my distaste of Tilda Swinton with this film. I still find her face a little bit too special, and in most of her roles, I see Tilda Swinton no matter what role she plays despite her obvious talent to play different characters. It’s this face that has trouble to change into something else. Tom Hiddleston however is the exact opposite. Even though his face also is a little special, somehow he manages to look different with every film, and it appears that he completely internalized his role of the somewhat androgynous vampire. His hide-out is beautiful and hideous at the same time, and his suicidal thoughts all too understandable when you have trouble finding enjoyment with the things you do. Of course the music was gloomy, but I didn’t dislike it. Every single one of Jarmusch’s films features brilliant music, although “Broken Flowers” (ironically a film I did not like) tops it all.
My favorite part of the film probably was the one featuring the sister. She was amazingly annoying and I kept wanting to jump at her and rip her eyes out, but that’s exactly what was so good about this part. The sister was portrayed in such a realistic way and her annoying character was so true to life, I thought to myself: “This is exactly how relatives are like.” Scary.
Loris, I think when you asked me what I thought about the film, I said exactly what I wrote in this post. My impression of the film probably hasn’t changed nor developed much, so there probably wasn’t anything new for you to discover here. I liked the film in general but I wasn’t very happy with the visuals and the plot development. Well, a comparably bad Jarmusch movie is still a masterpiece and this one is also a must-see.