amazing quote titles
yes, on Carol. And the projected-image Lacanian-esque way "mutual" desire is presented. I think it's possible that Todd Haynes thinks that this is simply how desire works, that it works more and less well in certain cases, and he thinks that this being the general tendency of desire isn't necessarily a bad thing. It only seems bad compared to the image we have of how relationships should work from years of sedimentary expectations of relationships from bad stories of relationships. I think this projected-image thing is a particular type of absurdity of romantic attachment which bisexual and homosexual people are more in touch with and comfortable with than people who find themselves to be strictly heterosexual, who are experiencing the same thing whether they know it or not, just at a higher level of psychosexual complication and blindness. Also, part of what I like about the film is how it is not *necessarily* an endorsement of Carol and Therese's relationship in any kind of hopefully eternal sense. The film allows their relationship to be viewed that way, but only if you want it to--and if you want it to, the film has some slight undercurrent quibbles with your desire for it to be so nice and neat. I think we can only say that the film only comes close to absolutely endorsing the Carol and Therese relationship in the sense that it is transient. It does a better job of affirming the special important of that which is precisely transient in romantic relationships (or relationships period) of any film I have ever seen. And without even being a stupid tendentious breakup film, and especially not preaching about tedious healthy minded approaches to breaking up. This is maybe its ultimate triumph.
the other thing about the whole photographer aspect with Therese is it gives her the opportunity to say the line "my friends are telling me I should be more interested in people" which is absolutely *crucial* to an understanding of what makes Therese so interesting, Mara's performance so brilliant, and Carol's characterization of her as an "angel flung out of space" so poignant.
As for defending my Sunrise comment. First of all: I mean it's not the worst thing but it's fun to get operatically upset over. I only mildly believe anything written in the following Sunrise section of this post, I'm just using extreme language because it gives a strong sense of clarification to my thoughts which are still very beneath the surface of my consciousness until I write about them. No need to get upset about any of it or take it at all personally if you adore the film. The extreme writing is just a mode to get me to confront why the film upset me, more than it is meant to condemn fans of the film. I'm not really condemning fans of the film at all so much as I am condemning ideology for allowing us to have fans of this film which is more bad than it seems, I think.
It's true that cinema in the 20s was pretty much exclusively displayed in urban areas. However in the 20s there were a greater number of people who still had a memory of living in the country, still were inherently suspicious of imagined "city values" in the preposterous way that is embodied by the Woman From The City, and it's really these people who I refer to as "country bumpkins" moreso than necessarily people who still lived in the country who happened to see it in the city (not uncommon for people from the country to travel to the city for the express purpose of seeing films though). It's true that the film isn't aspiring to serious social comment. But even if it doesn't aspire to serious social comment, it seems to me that it was made to emotionally exploit the kinds of stupid thinking about cities that the writers and filmmakers had to know were stupid, and I think the way it's done is dishonest. First of all in this presentation of The Woman From The City as this person who wants The Man to kill His Wife. Get the fuck out of here; I do not accept the responsibility of this representation of City Women at any level of abstraction; it's a completely disgusting representation, no matter how abstract it is. Perhaps especially because of how abstract it is, since she is not presented as just a particular woman but an embodiment of urban liberated femininity. The film only affirms femininity within urban spaces if that femininity attempts to create a simulation of what is stupidly defined as exclusively country attitudes of romantic relationships alive. It is not that I am opposed to the films endorsement of that simulation, but I am opposed to it's presentation of this as good and essentially country, and the essentially bad femininity as essentially urban and essentially bad because of its urban liberation. Just very very very bad ideology here. Not even authentically traditional, just modern reactionary bullshit. It's true that the film eventually, narratively, shows the hospitality of the city to "country" values, but I don't think it does so in a way which erases the initial impression of The Woman From The City as a kind of demonic force. Just completely fuck that; an infuriating thing, unacceptable. The film is really just truly abhorrent to me morally and ideologically in its gender politics; its outside the bounds of "oh I can still enjoy it because I forgive it because it is so old." It is bad even for something that is so old; compare it to Lubitsch's The Marriage Circle from the next year which both condemns aspects of and understands the value of liberated urban femininity. I relate to Sunrise only as an amazing aesthetic achievement, in the same way I would relate to a Riefenstahl film (the major Riefenstahl films are on balance for me much more aesthetically impressive than Sunrise, but obviously much more ideologically abhorrent). I admire them distantly but I can not feel identified with them in any sense and don't think it's an appropriate film to endorse in this day and age as a living favorite without very clear disclaimer (which is how most people endorse Sunrise).