The Girl Within

A take on the film The Danish Girl

by Love Esios

I have always been an enthusiast of visual and performance arts ever since I was in elementary. Though I was not gifted with the ability to draw straight lines and create accurate curves, I've always wondered what could have been in the mind of an artist while he/she was creating his/her masterpiece. Such vivid and powerful imagination behind that small ball of tissue.

In the movie The Danish Girl, that vivid and highly creative imagination would be found lingering inside the brain of Einar Wegener (portrayed by Eddie Redmayne). Einar used to be a highly respected and talented painters of his time until he found something else inside him -- Lily. His wife, Gerda (portrayed by Alicia Vikander) treated the whole circumstance as a role play until his husband couldn't hide his true identity anymore. And so, the painful process of losing her husband began... and it ended with Einar becoming Lily who underwent one of the first sex-change operations in history.

It's a beauty and a struggle seeing Eddie Redmayne portray Einar and Lily respectively. At the beginning of the movie, you would immediately observe the tenderness in his demeanor. I can imagine Einar being lost in his own world while working on his canvass. You can see in his eyes the love that he has for his wife. And the struggle from within him when he first realized that there is something wrong with him. The conflicting and inconvenient truth that he is Lily and that Einar is just a tiny figment of his own self. When he began the process of transforming to Lily, I found him really beautiful. It's hard to imagine that almost two years ago, Redmayne portrayed a character with motor neuron disease. His flexibility to give life to two different characters had earned him a nod to the Oscars.

Alicia Vikander was also amazing as Gerda. She was fierce, determined and her love for Einar -- unconditional. It made me think how sick and tragic it was to love someone who couldn't love you back. That she has lost her husband to a character that she had just imagined. If that was what really happened, you could also argue that perhaps Gerda also have that homosexual tendency because most of her art work were a reflection of what was also going through her mind.

Shot in the backdrop of 1920s Copenhagen, this riveting story of Einar and Gerda and the liberation of their own personalities would make you think of the real meaning of love, life and freedom that goes beyond one's gender preference.

As powerful as the message that director Tom Hooper wants to convey through this film, I'll give this a film a shot of 8 espressos.

A peculiar journey...Every Day (a review)

by Love Esios

Every Day's book cover grabbed from Google Images.

soul (n.)

- the spiritual part of a person that is believed to give life to the body and in many religions is believed to live forever 

If I'm going to define the word in a religious perspective, this definition given by Merriam-Webster dictionary may be the closest possible explanation I can think of when talking about souls. In the Catholic faith the soul is believed to be something that is bigger than yourself, though it is not something that is separate from yourself either. It is something that is part of you but is not entirely just you, because this is something that continues to live long after the body has already died. I haven't given much thought about souls. All I know is that the soul is a part of me, a very important aspect of my spirituality. My soul has been with me ever since I was born and it will depart from me when I die.

But what if we don't really have our own soul? What if a soul is just some kind of an invisible traveler that travels from one place to another? Well, in this book's case, the soul actually shifts from one body to another.

I can't really say my own understanding of what a soul is but it has changed after reading David Levithan's Every Day. I had a glimpse of its plot in my colleague's blog and just like how I fell in love with the other novels I have read in the past, I felt this unyielding curiosity to read it. A 16-year-old, gender-less and endlessly wandering soul (A -- yeah the name of this soul is just A) that inhabits different bodies every day of its life and eventually fell truly, madly, deeply in love with a girl (Rhiannon). Tell me, how can I resist a plot as intriguing and controversial (I think) as this? I thought the movie Her was the weirdest love story I've ever watched and heard. This book practically kicked it out and replaced it on top of my "ODD STORIES" list. I think I was particularly drawn to the soul's peculiar journey wherein he eventually finds the place where he belongs --- to the heart of the one and only girl he (or maybe it) truly loves.

How David Levithan presented the social issues in this book fascinates and at the same time intrigues me. Reading this book was like sailing in the calm seas --- very smooth and very easy. The way he explored each social issue, especially religion, depression and homosexuality, was very simple yet intense and fearless. These are the things that most teenagers are dealing nowadays. I must admit though, that some ideas were presented in a more blatant way (for me), especially the topics of religion and homosexuality.

The way he tells A and Rhiannon 's love story is so easy yet so complicated. It was compelling but at the same time disturbing. I remember this line from Ed Sheeran's song Thinking Out Loud,

"And I'm thinking 'bout how people fall in love in mysterious ways

Maybe it's all part of a plan..."

It was a strange way to fall in love. But in some ways, it also feels right. The only thing lacking about A is a physical body... but the rest -- the character, the emotions, the imperfections that make a person "human"... they're all there. It may look like a case of unconditional love at first, but when you look closely, it was unrequited love. In the book, Rhiannon would often reply A's "I love you" with another "I love you", but I didn't actually feel the words were heartfelt -- a stark contrast as to how A would normally say those words which always sincere and true. Perhaps in Rhiannon's point of view, it was a a set-up that were both difficult and hard to believe. Perhaps, she was just overwhelmed with A's engulfing love.

Maybe in a parallel universe, things like this happen. Maybe things like this is just normal. Things like the story of A and Rhiannon. It is an odd but beautiful masterpiece from Levithan. Something that is worth thinking about. So I guess it's just right to give it 9 cups of latte out of 10. ^^

Note:

If you wanna check out my colleague's own take on the novel, visit this site: 

Everybody's Every day 

http://theybascouniversity.wordpress.com/2014/11/06/everybodys-every-day/

Great blog! ^^