ESSAY:
How Simi Abe Welcomes me, a Stranger, in Home Movie
by Kesensa Mordi09/23/2022
Simi Abe’s creates a space that is familiar. A space that almost all of us will recognize. The short film encourages us as viewers to also create and possibly find a home for ourselves with each shot of the film feeling more personal than the previous one, the invite is clear. To see ourselves in the space that Abe is creating. To see our lives albeit - whether it is in London, Nairobi, or Houston, filled with the same noisy car alarms and arguing outside of our homes. As a viewer, I became excited to view each room in my home differently. What if I, too, positioned myself behind the curtains or on the sofa in such a manner that makes my home cinematic, which subsequently makes my life cinematic? The film beckons us to not only reimagine how we see spaces in our homes but further how we place things in our life. To see the beauty in the “creaking floorboards, [which] creak in more places than they do not”. Creating this intensity of beauty in that -- which is ordinary seems harmless at first. Why not see beauty and glamour in simplicity? However, the pause removing the non-diegetic sound of music brings me back to reality.
“What if I, too, positioned myself behind the curtains or on the sofa in such a manner that makes my home cinematic, which subsequently makes my life cinematic?”
Abe, although a devout film lover herself, is acknowledging our need to romanticize everything. Our desire for everything to be cinematic; To look good. To look aesthetically pleasing. Something intrinsically linked to a society that has grown up on Hollywood and film culture - that is heavily embedded into our wider culture. The whole film is an example of this philosophy. - Abe romanticizes all the relatively normal things we can relate to. Unpacked boxes when moving into a new space, seemingly plain curtains in the living room, creaky floorboards, and unwavering light, that comes and goes as quickly as rain and shine.
“How we choose to frame them, and how we choose to live in them”
More than just an enjoyable watch, but a film encouraging us all to reimagine the spaces we already exist in. How we choose to frame them, and how we choose to live in them. I am sure Abe is asking whether it is a real one, or an unreal one constructed to mimic cinema. What ‘home’ do we all create for ourselves?
Written, Directed, and Edited by Simi Abe
Composed by Shirley He
Here’s the link to watch the full short film: Home Movie
PAGE2FRAME
A Home for the Cinema Underground
A Home for the Cinema Underground