Romanticizing other places

One of my favorite films, Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris, develops around the idea of nostalgia and the idealization of the past. The story talks about the constant thought that living in a previous time is much better than living in the present. Protagonist, Gil, travels back in time to 1920 Paris where he delves into a non stop Golden Age party with cultural icons like Picasso, Hemingway, The Fitzgeralds, Salvador Dali, and Gertrude Stein. However, when he falls in love with one of Picasso's mistresses, Adriana, she wants to travel even further back in time to the Belle Epoque of the late 1800s. Thus, no one is satisfied with life in their corresponding present, and there is always this deep sentimentality towards the past.

"Isn’t that always how it goes? The past seems so much more vivid, more substantial, than the present, and then it evaporates with the cold touch of reality. The good old days are so alluring because we were not around, however much we wish we were."- A.O. Scott, New York Times. 

Images from Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris

Like Gil and Adriana, I think that I have always romanticized living somewhere else. Not necessarily in a previous time but instead in another place. I have always idealized living in picturesque cities like Amsterdam, Bordeaux, and Verona. But when I meditate about it, it is not really the idea of living in those cities that inspires me the most. It is actually the idea of escaping, of leaving everything behind, and of being on my own, that thrills me the most. 

The conversations that I have with my friends tend to be about other places. We often find ourselves talking about life in Europe or Asia, making bucket lists of mountains we want to hike, dishes we want to try, oases we want to dive in. I even have an Airbnb wish list of astronomical campsites and lodges in Chile. Who knows if I'll ever be able to visit. Our hunger to escape and explore is palpable, our calendars are marked and our travel journals are filled, we want to get lost in wanderlust.

For this reason I have decided to make a coming-of-age movie about an escape. About a girl (me) who carefully plans to leave home without a specific destination. However I want to approach this story the way Woody Allen does in Midnight in Paris, I don't want her to leave home as an "ambition toward immortality," Like A.O. Scott says in his film review for the Times. Instead, I want her to leave for memorabilia, or art, as if an inner force solicits her to wander and experience loneliness in order for her character to develop and ultimately understand the purpose of life, as of now at least.

Like Gil I want my main character's travels to connect her to the present, in this case to connect her to her home and her daily life, however monotonous or ennui it might be. In Midnight in Paris, Gil's adventures ultimately help him forge a connection with the present, and fall in love with a French girl in 21st Century Paris, while Adriana from the 1920s can not control her feelings and decides to stay further back in the Belle Epoque. 

I have been taking French classes since 8th grade. Last fall I applied to study my senior year abroad in the city of Rennes in Northern France. I was accepted two weeks ago, and I will start the school year in September. I guess that now I am officially going to "escape" from home. Now that this is part of reality I can't deny that I have doubts about my decision. I hate having mixed feelings, but I have always been a mixed-feelings kind of person throughout my life. There has never been a decision that I haven't considered more than twice, the uncertainty cloud is always raining above me, it is just a thing I have always had to deal with. I keep telling my mom that I don't want to escape home, and that I love home.

I wonder what my real adventures will bring next year. I hope this film can work as an illustration of how I feel right now. 

References: Scott, A. O. "The Old Ennui and the Lost Generation." The New York Times. The New York Times, 19 May 2011. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.