The thing we call love

Hisham Ashkar

The latest long feature by Ghassan Salhab, The River, is a story about an ex-couple spending a day together in the countryside. It is also a story within a story. But no! The second story is not the apparent context of war and the series of unusual events. Considering The River from this point would add nothing but confusion and mystification to what is, in fact, a story well-rooted in reality. The second story is about narration. Already, Salhab had hinted at that in the beginning. Still, it was too subtle, even for the standards of his previous movies. One might argue that Salhab is pushing his habitual subtlety to a degree of incomprehension, incoherence, or even abstract experimentalism and symbolism. I would say it is the opposite, and that subtlety was never as essential or justifiable —if I may use this term— in his movies as it is with The River. It is also good to remember that, in his work, Salhab always has reality and real life as a reference. He remains loyal to them… as much as he can, for after depicting real-life loyally, he does shift it slightly. The River is bathed in reality, or, more accurately, in two complementary ones, reality per se and that of memory. But before going forward, we must take a slight detour involving his last three movies.

The River is the third and final installment in a triptych, following The Mountain and The Valley. While the first two films are already different on many levels, the last one added many disparities. But if Salhab says they are a triptych, let us take him at his word and see —in brief— how the films sit next to each other. Both The Mountain and The Valley tell the story of a man in a given situation and a particular state of mind. The River does not deviate from this rationale. Although it revolves around two characters, the man and the woman are not treated equally. The movie follows the man, and it is centered around him. However, the first two movies accompany the man at close range, more descriptively, providing some details (although scarce) about their social situation or history. It even harbors certain scenes totally unrelated to the man. Moreover, in both films, it is not that clear what’s on the man’s mind. It is confusing and even amnesic —literally. As for The River, we know one thing about the man and one thing only: what he is thinking of. And he is thinking about one thing and one thing only: the woman. All this implies that the main difference resides in how the movies are narrated. The first two look like a third-person narrative, while the third is obviously narrated in the first person. In a first-person narrative, a character tells the reader —the viewer, the audience— what he sees, what he hears, what he thinks of, what he is feeling, and what he remembers. And this is precisely what is taking place in The River. Unlike the first two movies, it is not a story about the man; it is the story of the man.

Salhab took the first-person narrative and pushed it to its extreme, or, rather, to how it actually functions in real life. The man has no need to tell information about himself because he (and supposedly you) already know. There is no need to explain or describe things unless he feels like doing it. And, of course, there are no scenes in The River about other characters or situations, simply because he did not experience them or they are not relevant to his act of remembering. All the scenes are about the man or what he is witnessing, remembering, or imagining. And imagination is an integral part of the memory. We rarely remember things as they really were. The memory/imagination intervenes to fill certain gaps, add others, or even re-correct or repeat or re-imagine. The procedure is used more than once in The River, such as when the man enters the cave twice, while the woman standing next to him, and another without her presence. In The Mountain and in The Valley, scenes and events are consequential. This is not the case with The River because the act of remembering does not need to be consequential. In The Mountain and in The Valley, all scenes are realistic, and even if some of them look more or less improbable, this does not exclude their probability and, foremost, their realism. In The River, this does not matter —for the act of remembering is not only about the restitution of facts but also reliving past sensations. Remembering is foremost about feelings, to try to at least retrieve those past emotions. And this is generally done through reconstructing, enhancing, or even fabricating certain situations or scenes. Take for example a clearly imagined scene, the one of the woman wandering between the trees, which are numbered, and holding plastic bags filled with transparent liquid. Well, yes, this scene could hold certain interpretations and references —already there is an apparent (and personal) reference to the movie director’s year of birth, as the woman stopped in front of the tree numbered 58— but trying to discern or to identify the symbolism or meaning of that scene would prove to be futile. Instead, one must look at what feelings and emotions such scenes are providing.

A first-person narrative is rarely a real-time narration. In general, and as it is apparent in The River, it is the story of the man remembering these events or telling them to someone. A more conventional director would make that clearer, for instance, opening the film with a voice-over introducing the (their) story. But Salhab proceeded differently. First, he did start with a voice-over and some scenes (before the opening credits), implying this sort of narration. Still, it was very subtle and won’t be grasped until late in the movie or even when watching it for the second time. And second, he created a real-life first scene (after the opening credits), the sound of people leaving the restaurant, the waiter passing in the background, the trashy pop music, and then something happened. The music died. People disappeared. He evacuated everything in the immediate surrounding of the man that can affect or be of nuisance to his object of desire/obsession and to his state of mind. In other words, he evacuated everything irrelevant to his narrative.

He did keep the background, though, but this background cannot influence or interfere in the story unless he and the characters decide to. Events, mainly in the first half of the movie, seem to contradict this statement: the trashy pop song did make a comeback, and sounds of human activities resurface, drawing some reactions from the movie’s characters. As for the background, and most prominently the fighter jets, they did have an impact, even affecting the characters physically. But all this would be to forget that in Salhab’s world —as in real life, too— there are no definitive, clear cuts. Sudden or abrupt events take their time to dissipate and disappear. The question is not their presence or impact but how important and lasting they are. Take the issue of fighter jets, for instance. At a certain point, the woman was terrified by their sound and their raids. She even froze, physically. However, after a while —no more than an hour or so— and as the woman looked at the sky, the man remarked, “we can’t hear them anymore.” Surprised, The woman asked him, “who?” and the man had to clarify he was referring to fighter jets. The woman had already forgotten what terrified her not so long ago! The impact of jets was restricted in time; it was ephemeral with no effect on the story’s development. There were no lasting feelings of fear or threat, and the setting where the story proceeded —the forest— was a neutral, even at times, comfortable space.

So why were there fighter jets in the movie? Is it a fixture in the man’s memory and mind? Is it because The River is taking place in the same world of war in which The Valley concluded? Is it just a reference to present-day Lebanon and the constant presence of hostile fighter jets in its skies? Ultimately, jets are just elements in the background, similar to landmine warning signs, or fences, or hunting cartridges —different elements that can be encountered nowadays in Lebanese woods. They are there in the movie just because they are there in real life, independent of our existence. But why did the man (or Salhab) put some emphasis on them? Why did the man pick a hunting cartridge before throwing it away instead of a stone or a plant, let’s say? Is it to keep being reminded that we live in a world full of many types of violence? Probably yes. But still, this is just a background. And as in real life, there are things we encounter, or take notice of, or interact with, or get affected by. But then we redirect our attention to what is essential to us at the moment. And for the man, it is the woman.

The first scene encapsulated the story. The shot/reverse shot scene shows the man and the woman sitting at a table on the terrace of a restaurant. They look mentally and physically exhausted —he, more than she. They are silent. It seems there is nothing left to say. They exhausted their words too. A typical scene of two people aware that what is/was between them is already over. A typical scene at the end of a relationship, or in the period just following this end —as revealed later in the film. A period where things, though clear enough, have not settled quite yet. She is looking to her side. He is looking straight at her. For her, their story belongs more to the past. For him, it is still in the present. The remaining two hours of the movie are nothing but an extension of this scene. No significant change will occur. And the final scene is just a return to the initial one. The man’s final words in the movie, “I love you,” could have been uttered, though tacitly, before the first scene. And the woman’s muted reaction was similar in these two scenes, though the second time is more aggravated, no doubt. But, of course, it is the second time, and it seems she did answer his statement/question more than once. She already said in the middle of the movie that “love is not enough.”

This movie is not about a journey; it is more about (re)confirmation. Such situations when ex-lovers meet or spend time together, while certain things are still suspended, do not belong to the present, as in living the moment or turning towards the future. They are also suspended in time and still attached to the past. No doubt, the man still has hopes or expectations, but he is well aware that it is over. The look on his face in the first scene said it all. We are in a typical Spinozian situation. The rational awareness of reality does not alter the affects that guide our acts. We know it is hopeless. But still, we try, even though we are aware that this attempt will lead nowhere. And there is nothing better to solve (temporarily?) this situation than to confront it with reality.

The first scene structured the movie. We are in a situation where there is nothing left to talk of. All was said and done. The scarcity and the nature of the dialogues reflect that. They cannot talk about the past or shared interests —they already know them, and it is not time yet to invoke memories— aside from what they haven’t shared with each other yet, some bits and pieces: a dream or the clandestine filming. They cannot talk about the future because it does not exist yet. They cannot talk about normal things because their situation is not normal yet. They haven’t passed this suspended period yet. They were left with some banalities, reflections, the other bits and pieces, and lots of emptiness. Salhab’s loyalty to real-life situations made him transpose it as is on screen, even when it comes to its pace. The movie’s duration is more or less equivalent to the story’s timeframe. It began sometime in the afternoon and ended not long after dusk. This description gives the impression that it is an exhausting or frustrating movie as if Salhab wants the viewer to experience the same feelings and the same situation as the man does. But it is not intended to be a bleak experience because Salhab made sure to furnish the movie with plenty of appealing details —not to mention the exquisite landscape— many of which are subtle, and some not at all.

And here, I am referring to the mythological or biblical references in the movie. In one scene, the man and the woman found themselves in an apple grove. He handed her an apple. She reacted, “all that’s missing is a snake.” Salhab just handed us on a platter a replication of Adam and Eve’s story, with roles reversed. It would be tempting to extrapolate a specific symbolism or even a psychological or metaphysical meaning. However, while the resemblance is striking on the surface, when it comes to the essence of the two scenes, there is little in common. Any extrapolation would be based mainly on the imagination of the viewer. An interesting exercise, I would say, but one that is not based on the reality of the movie and on the meaning of Adam and Eve’s scene. Not everything needs to have deep meaning. It can be just a coincidence, just like in real life. Sometimes we realize that we are in a situation that holds a resemblance to a famous story or myth, and then we joke about it. And that’s it. It is that simple. But if one really wants to dig deeper, it is more relevant to look at what is in common between the mythological references. The man also referred to a painting of Salome holding the head of John the Baptist on a platter. Yet another story on the downfall of a man at the hands of a woman. And here, there is a more interesting question to ask: in his attempt to get her back, is the man playing the guilt card? Trying to make her feel guilty. After all, love and relations are also a game.

“Love is not enough,” she said. And this movie is precisely about that. It is not a movie about love, or the quest for it, or the loss of it. It is more about what to do with love after the end of the relationship. It is already over, but the physical and emotional memories persist. Everything needs to take its time. And in this suspended time, all is about inconsistencies. Where to draw the line between the distance —imposed by the new situation, the end of the relationship— and the familiarity, affection, and intimacy —that defined the previous situation? Mutual masturbation is okay, but kissing is not. Indulging in carnal pleasure is still appropriate, but make sure not to exceed a precise emotional limit. (It is tempting to add, as if stepping on a landmine, if one wants to draw an easy metaphor from the movie)… but let us go back to the sex scene, the mutual masturbation. There is something striking about it. It is not elegant enough, it is not classy enough, it is not physically fluid, and it does not correspond to the ideal of sex as represented in cinema and in Salhab’s previous movies. It looks unrefined, a bit messy, and a bit uncomfortable, as it is with sex in real life. Sexual pleasure is not in what the image provides but in what the act provides to the man and the woman.

In this scene, the characters were positioned one behind the other. A visual reminder that in sex (and in love), we are never together; we are always alone. We do not feel or get sexual pleasure together, but with someone, next to someone, side by side, alone. When in a relationship, we do not experience the same things. We do not feel the same things. There is always a gap. What matters is the extent of this gap. And as the relationship crumbles, the gap becomes apparent, but it was always there. And the movie is punctuated by the fluctuation in this gap.

We are always alone. Let us take a few scenes with some insight into the period when the man and the woman were still a couple. The first is on the videos on his mobile phone. Nearly all videos are of her —and few on unrelated subjects. There is none of them together. Another interesting aspect is the purpose of taking photos or videos at a particular time. Yes, in a relationship, people take photos of themselves and each other. Still, in general, it is sporadic, either for fun, commemorating something, or similar other reasons. But when one realizes that the relationship is ending, things change. The purpose becomes to capture as much of the other person, the woman, in all her states so as not to lose her entirely after the end (the loss) of the relationship. And that is what the videos on the mobile phone are telling. The end was already evident. This afternoon, in the forest, the man kept taking videos. Of course, realizing the end is one thing, and admitting it is another. The second is the man’s dream that he already knew the woman before meeting her. As it turned out, the woman in his dreams does not correspond to The woman. But isn’t love also an encounter between the imaginary and reality? A convergence of two imaginaries of two persons and a reality. We are always alone. And the gap fluctuates.

As the movie draws to an end, the gap takes a sharp physical form: the man and the woman are walking on the opposite banks of the river. The man stopped and looked straight at the woman. The woman continued walking out of the screen. For her, their story belongs more to the past. For him, it is still in the present. Nothing has changed. A repeat of and an extension of the first scene at the restaurant. The movie closes with the man telling the woman, “I love you.” This is not a declaration of love or affirmation that he still loves her. The woman already knows that he loves her. The man already knows that the woman loves him too. Love is not the question, but “love is not enough.” When we say “I love you,” it is rarely confined just to these three words. There is always a set of implicit questions: “I love you. Do you love me? Do you want us to be back together?” and so on. The woman left him with no answer. She had already answered him… many times before. He already knows her answer… he heard it or felt it many times before. Is it a question of yet another confirmation? And how many times do we need confirmations… the answer lies with the voice-over, at the very start of the movie: until the moment we admit that something has changed in us, that we have changed…

or maybe never.