BY İREM NAZ DUYMUŞ (AMER/III) & EDA EMEKOĞLU (AMER/III)
These Eyes Realize
Whether school is in session or not, students ought to have solid recommendations from a mediocre member of the Letterboxd community who wears prescribed sunglasses everywhere and every day. These eyes are always on the lookout for something worthwhile and have chosen a movie for you to enjoy during a slightly breezy summer evening on a very hot August day. I don’t know if it’s just me, but August feels like the adopted sister of summer and always reminds me of endings. Therefore, it calls for something warm yet nostalgic, funny yet somber. “A Real Pain” by Jesse Eisenberg, an Academy Award-winning movie, is my pitch for this specific season. The scenario seems basic from afar, yet touches upon nostalgia, chaos, family and death. Kieran Culkin brings life into his character through his mimics and gestures and ultimately pulls you into his emotionally unstable orbit. Jesse Eisenberg, on the other hand, delivers anxiety so convincingly that I genuinely felt like I was being watched during a typical school week. Their characters, perfectly designed for a polar opposite brotherly relationship, demonstrate the challenges of a family so realistically that you can see yourself in the same situation. “A Real Pain” is an easy movie to watch, but a hard one to digest considering how it reflects a painful part of history and personal hardships. Ultimately, the movie lingers and leaves you with either a sense of how much pain we are entitled to as individuals or an understanding of how valuable it is to live that we can endure pain. How much pain is enough pain? How is living in pain a way to live? If these thoughts follow you out of the theater or off the couch, let them. Maybe even let “Linger” by The Cranberries play in your headphones as you walk it off—because some films deserve a soundtrack that aches in the same key.
Perhaps you’ll just click “Watched” on your Letterboxd profile and move on. That’s okay too. Either way, that’s all from behind these tinted lenses—for now. I’ll keep looking out, behind prescribed sunnies, to find the next thing worth mentioning that changes the light just enough to notice something new. Because sometimes it takes a little shade to see what really sticks.
Until then, don’t forget to read, write and have fun.
