after people watch mismo they frequently ask me questions about identity...or persona for that matter...mismo is a movie about identity...modern identity...urban identity...how we view ourselves...how others view us...
central to any discussion on persona is not just talking about self-image but how that self-image...or societal image...interacts with our naked self...the way we intuitively see ourselves when all of society's artifices and clothes are pulled from our existential body...
when there is a separation between the public image and the naked self...you serve two masters...often in conflict though...when they are aligned...you can say...harmony...
in mismo, toni, the voyeuristic psychologist exemplifies the painful split between public persona and authentic self....on the surface...you have a 'successful' person...an 'accomplished' professional...all according to cultural metrics...yet internally...you can tell toni just wants to scream...her past...her desire to be something different than what she is...just bubbles in her...just screaming to get out...
she is caught in a vicious cycle...you look at her and want to say she is mean...is she?...or is she merely stuck in a pattern of self-loathing that you could only pity?...by the end of the movie i suspect you pity her...no? she longs for love in the midst of a public self shadowed by dark secrets...
here is a woman who seemingly has it all...she received the utmost cultural training at a distinguished university...she has a beautiful flat in san franciscio...a successful practice...yet she yearns internally for connection...
a connection she so desperately missed during her youth...she was mixed up with unsavory activities...not by choice...many of things we do as an adolescent are a consequence of just being physically present...nothing more than that...we rarely give great thought to the higher moral order during adolescence...we long to live...not analyze...
yet we can't escape the experiences we have...they are what they are...we take them into adulthood...just like toni can't help escape her sketchy past...it's a part of her...yet as an adult... she struggles to incorporate it into her life as whole...like many people i know...she suffers immensely under the cloak of multiple lives...lives that rarely speak to each other...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment