My Love Affair With Cinema – Pt 2
By Belen Maluenda | July 23, 2020
Growing up, my childhood James Bond mania snowballed into a full-blown obsession with cinema. For years, I dedicated myself to devouring films from my watch list, nurturing my passion fanatically.
When I finally had the chance to study cinema in-depth in university, I felt that I was following my childhood dreams by turning my passion into a tangible part of my identity. I would get a degree in film then find some film-centric career. Cinema, this magical, perfect art, would define me. Somehow
However, two years into college and halfway through my film theory major, I began to have an anxiety-inducing realization: my ardent passion for movies, which had been my life’s compass, had begun to cool. Ironically, this occurred when I left for a film-focused study abroad semester in Scotland.
An Overshadowing Interest
Studying abroad was the first time I had the opportunity to explore strange new places on my own and on my own terms. I left for Europe a few weeks before the start of the semester to backpack a little, attend a couple of festivals, and to meet up with a golden-hearted Scot I had befriended while he was an exchange student at my university. Setting out to immerse myself in different cultures and making new friends abroad was thrilling and deeply satisfying, but it left me feeling confused.
My new enthusiasm for travel had begun to eclipse my love for cinema. When I settled into my studies at the University of Stirling, I realized that I no longer craved movies as I had all my life. After being able to set off on my own solo adventures, I realized that part of what obsessed me with cinema was that it had always satisfied my yearning for the excitement and adventure that I was now free to pursue in real life.
After my first month in Scotland, I began to grapple with the distressing realization that I was no longer sure I wanted to make film my career. The worst part was that I felt that not pursuing film would be a betrayal of my childhood dreams. Now here I was, halfway around the world, with a curriculum totally devoted to preparing me for a future I was no longer sure I wanted. Oddly enough, the thing that helped me reconcile these disorienting shifts came from my rather unglamorous new living situation.
New Faces And Tight Spaces
The study abroad dorms took a little getting used to. Most of the foreign exchange students were put into shared flats, each with around a half dozen people from different countries. We all quickly grew accustomed to the thin plywood walls, puny kitchens, shared mini fridges, and persnickety smoke detectors that screeched at the slightest wisp of steam.
It was all part of the adventure, part of the novelty of leaving our respective realities to spend a college semester learning, exploring, and struggling to keep up with our lively hosts in Scotland. We bonded through rousing nights out that began with sardine tin bus rides to the local bars and ended with liquor-addled pilgrimages to the chippies. These fast food joints stayed open until the wee hours of the morning to feed the ravenous, dilapidated creatures that wobbled out of the closing venues.
The tight spaces and nighttime revelries certainly did a lot to break the ice between the foreign exchange students. But a more low-key group activity that bonded us left a mark on me as I grappled with my little vocational identity crisis.
Gathering Around Encapsulated Dreams
At the suggestion of yours truly, my flat mates and I all pitched in and bought a small projector for our living room. Our flat’s small common area became the dorm’s hub for lazy movie nights and weekend morning recoveries.
The first time we gathered around the projector, I was struck by the magic of the moment. We were a varied group of personalities, all with vastly different backgrounds, cultures, and life experiences. Yet as we scrunched together on the blue-vinyl-cushioned seats and on blankets spread out on the floor, we were united in the shared experience of these riveting, encapsulated dreams.
I was reminded of the father-daughter film marathons with which I first began to appreciate the magic of cinema as a child. I had always loved that we could escape together into other times and other worlds, love and hate the same heroes and villains, and laugh and cry over the same jokes and tragedies. Making this connection as I sat in those dorm movie nights made me realize that this was the real magic of cinema.
Changing My Relationship To Film
I learned that artful cinematography, captivating performances, and intriguing scripts don’t just form vehicles through which we can escape the mundane aspects of reality. Rather, films are timeless, sharable, and uniquely accessible works of art that offer people the bridge of a shared experience regardless of who, when, or where they are.
With this insight, I began to understand that I didn’t need to make film my career to involve myself in the magic that movies made me feel. I ruminated on these revelations during the rest of my study abroad semester and during my subsequent solo backpacking trip.
As my adventures yielded new discoveries about unexplored facets of myself, I began to understand that identities are fluid. Our perspectives shift as we continuously discover new passions and interests. Over time, things that once captivated us can become less significant. Because of this, it’s not a good idea to base our sense of self on external fancies as we try to understand and develop our identities.
This change in perspective helped me decide to make Film Studies a minor instead of my major. I had feared the decision would feel like a betrayal of my childhood self. But I realized that it would be a bigger betrayal of my future self to cling onto cinema just because it had once been my primary passion.
I’m still enamored by cinema, but I’ve stopped trying to live through it. I’ve stopped using it to construct my identity or make it a lens through which I understand who I am. I’ve learned to love movies for what they can make me feel, how they can help us understand each other, and how they can bring people together.
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this piece and I’d love to hear your feedback on it in the comment section! Have any movies changed your perception or played a significant role in your life?
