Melancholy

Years ago I went to see a movie with my best friend at the time. It was Lars Van Trier's Melancholia. I remember watching it, and being uncomfortable but, as a film studies student, loving all the beauty that went into the film making. I recognized the themes and the depths of those themes. I recognized all the editing techniques and camera movements that helped convey those themes.

Now I live it.

The movie is currently available on Netflix. The style and direction is not for everyone, but it is a very important film because it shows depression in a way the world never sees. Depression is just "sadness" to many people. Something to over come and get over on your own. No one can fathom how it takes over both mind and body in a debilitating way.

Now I know it.

There is a sequence at the beginning setting up what to expect from the rest of the film by using visual metaphors for depression. The first half of the film shows the spiral of depression the main character, Justine, experiences while all the characters around her are oblivious and full of happiness and life. The second half is the characters dealing with an external problem causing chaos and despair around them. As soon as the act starts, we are faced with a scene where Clair - Justine's sister - is helping her out of bed and into a bath. You can feel the weight of Justine's body as she cannot control it. As she has to be pulled out of bed. As she has to be forced in the tub. She then has to be brought to a table to eat and her body hangs as she tries so hard to eat the food in front of her. She then weeps.

This is who I am.

I haven't seen the film in years. In fact, probably only one more time on DVD a year or two after seeing it in theaters. But that first scene in the second half keeps popping in my brain. It's because this is who I am now. I am becoming Justine. I feel like this body isn't my own. That the weight of this thing around my soul is too heavy to lift, or my will is too weak to try. It takes me so long to get out of bed. It takes me so long to get off the couch. I cannot do anything. While I am at work, I cannot seem to bring myself to do anything. That continues at home as well. The chores are still not being done. Remember the dishes? Remember how I said I would try? Mentally I am trying to pull myself up. Out of bed or off of the couch. I am mentally trying so hard to get up and do something, but I am stuck. My body is too heavy to move.

Yesterday a friend came over and brought dinner. I couldn't lift myself off of the couch to greet her. I stayed, laid, under the covers, crying, for the first 10 minutes she arrived. Eventually I started to sit up, slowly, but I didn't leave the couch the entire time she was there.

This is what I am.

There is a light inside me. It's small, and dim, but it's still there. The light is what was me, not this heavy case around me that is gluing me to the ground. The real Jessica is buried deep within. Sometimes I see a flicker of her when I look at myself in the mirror. Sometimes she comes out during a fun song that makes her sing. Sometimes the people around her can bring her out and let her shine. But the leaden body swallows it in moments. I looked at myself in the mirror this morning, smiled as I saw a glimmer of myself, then watched as my smile slowly faded again. The literally definition of Happiness fleeting.

I am still here.
I am still here.
I AM STILL HERE!

This is the only thing that keeps me going. Even as I write this out, I am slumped over my desk because the weight is incommodious. I am smiling to those around me, but I just cannot will myself to do anything. But I am still here. I got up in the morning. I made it to work. I am still here. I will do it again tomorrow. And then again the next day. And again. And again. Again.

Here is a short case study on the film Melancholia and depression in film below: