the way i gasped when she wolfed down that skillet of worryingly undercooked eggs

“I want to be near you.”
“Come over.”
“I want to kiss you.”
“Then kiss me.”
“I want to love you.” 
“Then love me.”

CW: sex, bisexuality, closet reference, SW reference, hunger/homelessness

The two young women wander through grainy greyscale streets, eat ravenously with the meager scraps of money they have, huddle together for warmth, and use chaotic tactics to get what they need. They repeat their circumstances, "I'm hungry," "I'm cold," to each other, like a game, defying their circumstances with almost whimsical dreams and resourceful awareness of the streets they wander. Their hopes and passions are subsumed at times by their needs, but they survive in dark alleys as they talk of adventures toward romance (but the only romance we see is between them is this the closet is this bisexuality is this exploration is this innocence is this all of the above). They wield themselves as weapons against deprivation, and find the physical transactions as meaningless as their descendant in Fat Girl would more than a decade later. Survival and dreams mix awkwardly here.

52 project: 85/52

“Let’s eat.”

”we’ve got to age first.”

goes ahead to put on eyeliner

Extremely poignant and very real look at late adolescence; shows me things I haven't seen anywhere in movies and reminds me of parts of my life I'd forgotten. The girls are delighted with their brand new opportunity to adult, and they think they're winning big wins... because they're too unsophisticated to understand how their behavior plugs them into a system of oppression they don't yet recognize.

Did Wes Anderson ever mention Chantal Akerman as an influence, coz gurlllll??!!

Whenever you feel hungry, cold, or lonely....just light a cigarette

I too am hungry and cold atm.

It feels odd to describe this short as "delightful," since it deals with themes such as homelessness and vagrancy. However, the whimsicality through which Akerman frames her two protagonists' struggle, together with their apparent emotional imperturbability, makes for a rather amusing experience.

What I find the most interesting when contrasting this to Akerman's previous body of work is how, in her 20s, she was able to offer some on-the-spot portrayals of middle-aged women (Jeanne Dielman, The Meetings of Anna), while here, at 34, she proves still capable of capturing the feelings of youth. She does so with an approach opposite to the films I just cited, as she focuses on restlessness and speed. The two characters move from place to place with no break, constantly state their thoughts with no filter and never seem to rest. I'm surprised that "I'm tired" isn't one of the ailments that they complain about, but perhaps that's intentional.

They ate

“i’m cold. i’m hungry. give me a cigarette.”
girlie knows the importance of a cigarette at these times ;) ‧₊˚⊹

— this movie whole atmosphere was pretty good and i really liked the dialogues. there’s just something in chantal’s style that it’s totally iconic ! i think i could watch this on repeat for quite a time <3 𓂅