Call Me by Your Name - the book

Andre Aciman

                                             

I just finished Call Me by Your Name - the book. The second time. It almost reduced me to tears. Do I feel uncomfortable about it? Maybe a little and a little confused about my reaction. The book has universal appeal and most of the readers will likely find something in the book that they can relate to. The book about love, the love one longs for and seldom if ever experiences. I could say after the father of Elio “I may have come close, but I never had what you had. Something always held me back or stood in the way.” Thinking about my life it was just like that. I think I had an inkling that the love can be all-encompassing, uniting people to feeling one when “calling me by your name” is the description of the feeling. All too romantic, all too idealistic, all insensible? So why did I, together with so many people in the world got so moved by the book and the film? At least part of us longs for these ideal feelings. Or regret that they did not experience it.

I wonder what stopped me in the past from giving my all to another person. Was it a lack of the right object to desire and trust? Was is self-protection which equates to lack of courage? Maybe common sense? Too much self-control? Whatever it was I did not go the way Elio went. I know that Elio is just a figment of the imagination of some clever and sensitive men – Andre Aciman, the author, Luca Guadagnini the director of the film and Timothee Salamet – the actor playing Elio. But what they created touched so many nerves and emotions of so many people. There must be more to it than just sentimentality. If fact sentimentality is not what characterizes the book or the film. Just tender and deep feelings expressed masterfully and truthfully.

The people I thank for the beautiful story and feelings. The cast, Guadanino(far right) and Aciman in the middle. Enio is the one in the violet jacket 

                              

What Elio’s father says to his son who had to say goodbye to his lover is often commented on as an object of envy of parents who were not able to be that giving and understanding. One of the reasons why I read the book was to get the words of the father in this particular scene. They go like that:

“You had a beautiful friendship. Maybe more than a friendship. And I envy you. In my place, most parents would hope the whole thing goes away, or pray that their son lands up on their feet soon enough. But I am not such a parent. In your place, if there is pain, nurse it, and if there is flame, don’t snuff it out, don’t be brutal with it. Withdrawal can be a terrible thing when it keeps us awake at night and watching others forget us sooner than we’d want to be forgotten is no better. We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster than we should that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to feel nothing so as not to feel anything – what a waste!

I may have come close, but I never had what you had. Something always held me back or stood in the way. How you live your life is your business. But remember, our hearts and our bodies are given to us only once. Most of us cannot help but live as though we got two lives to live, one is the mockup, the other the finished version, and then there are all those versions in between. But there is only one, and before you know it, your heart is worn out, and, as for your body, there comes the point when no one looks at it, much less wants to come near it. Right now, there’s sorrow. I don’t envy the pain. But I envy you the pain. “

OK, so I am under the spell of the book and the film. I already ordered a couple of books by Andree Aciman. He is a writer, an academic and a university lecturer on Proust and this is worthwhile exploring as well.  And I will. Some posts will follow, no doubt.

In spite of writing about a book again, I have some life outside my home as well. I have seen the exhibition of Dutch Old Masters in the Sydney Art Gallery. Not too extensive, but some really good examples of the paintings of the time. It was good to take a walk through some green parts of Sydney. Did not move me that much as the book did though. Different pleasure, I guess.

The best film of 2017 – Call Me by Your Name

                                     

As I am up and about I decided to catch up on movies. I am glad that the first film I decided to see after the break was Call Me by Your Name. I believe that it will disappear from my local cinema soon and it would have been such a shame not to have seen it. I was not aware that this is another film by Luca Guadagnino. Not that I knew that another two films that made a particular impression on me were made by the same person. Now I see the very strong emotional similarities in all three films.  The other two are I Am Love and A Bigger Splash. It has been some time ago that I saw the other films and at that time I did not link them. The links that for me are strongest are between I Am Love and Call Me by Your Name. Both of the films show love or rather submission to ecstatic love in a similar way. Both made me a bit uncomfortable in the way they show the naked feelings of passion. Nothing vulgar about it, just so honest and natural that somebody, maybe a little prude like myself, finds it slightly uncomfortable. Those are touching and memorable scenes, though.

Both of the films show the tremendous beauty of Italy. The first one presents elegantly stylized interiors of a Milanese modern mansion and the other rather messy, but full of objects of considerable beauty and books, lakeside villa somewhere in the Northern Italy. And of course, abundance of Italian nature in both of the films as a background to uninhibited feelings.

Call Me by Your Name is a film about a young, very intelligent and sensitive, talented boy and his awakening sexuality. Sensuality is build into him through the environment he lives in and his absolutely incredible parents. I wonder if such parents really exist? My direct experience is of life in the middle-class situation and the film is about academics involved in higher artistic pursuits. Maybe this can make a difference and maybe the times are now of higher acceptance of non-conventional love? I still look at the film from a perspective of an older person who only watched the changes rather than lived through them.

   

So, it is about Elio, 17teen-year-old American-Italian who spends summer holidays with his parents in their villa somewhere in Northern Italy. Oliver the American graduate student of Elio’s father comes to spend some weeks with the family. He is given the room of Elio and gaining a description of ‘usurper’ said with a French accent. The dialogs are interchangeable English-Italian-French. The relationship starts with some reservations and almost unfriendliness towards the young American who says “later” to finish a conversation which Elio considers inappropriate and rude. This is how it sometimes is in early stages of love which has not yet come to realization of what it really is all about. Oliver is a very beautiful man and his physical beauty is shown as typically beautiful women are shown. He is not feminine at all though; his body is sculptured like Roman statues. And this is beautiful. 

Elio is at the stage of life when he is about to discover sharing his sexuality with another person. He does not have particular preferences as far as sex is concerned and I find it refreshing if not surprising. There is a girl he thinks of having his first experience with and then this fascination with this older then himself man takes over his senses and desires. Sharing on intellectual level takes precedence. And this is what the story is all about. The love between two men, true, romantic, homosexual love. And this is beautiful. I started to understand homosexual love, I think.

The role of Elio’s parents in amazing. At the early stages of the romance, the mother already sees what is going on and with full understanding what turmoil her son may be experiencing reassures him saying that Oliver likes him more than Elio likes Oliver. This is like an advice given by a more experienced person. While I had been in a similar situation with my mother supporting my first love it was a girl-boy type of love.  In the film, the support of the parent went further and this is the change of times, I noticed with some surprise.

Equally moving was a tender scene between Elio and his father who, knowing how difficult parting of the two lovers may be for his son, talks to him with deep understanding and empathy about the beauty of love in all its forms; sorrow and sadness being a part of it.

                                                   

At one stage the father said that the first love is most valuable and most powerful and that to each following one we have less to give. This I found particularly true. It explained some of my personal experience only too well. I think I may order the book on which the film is based on. Apparently, the scene between the father and son is taken verbatim from the book. There is also a different ending. Hmm… I am curious. Five out of five for the film.